Discord: understand how it works and the precautions – 06/26/2023 – Tech

Discord, an online application popular with young people and video game players, works as a platform for text, voice and video conversations. The system created in 2015 has become popular for chatting during online games, with an adult user base and those under 18 years of age, without distinction or barriers.

The platform, however, became lawless land in groups that promote content involving sexual exploitation, pedophilia, self-mutilation, racism, animal abuse and incitement to murder. Discord said in May that it works to block what it called “abhorrent content.”

According to Fantástico (Globo), the app is also being used by abusers to commit crimes of violence against girls, with humiliation, aggression and threat of leaking intimate photos. In an interview with Fantástico, the company’s spokesperson said that the platform removes undue content and there are investigations of groups that may be involved in threats to children, for the removal of agents.

For experts, the versatility made it easy for the platform to become a kind of lawless land with groups that encourage sexual crimes and violence.

Another controversy involving the application occurred in April this year: the platform was used to publish images of leaked documents detailing secret Pentagon information.

Experts consider Discord to be a light version of 4chan, the far-right anonymous forum known for sharing conspiracy theories.

At the end of 2021, Discord had more than 150 million monthly active users, being valued at $14.7 billion, according to PitchBook, a provider of market data.

What is Discord and how does it work?

The platform was created in 2015 by Jason Citron and Stanislav Vishnevskiy, computer programmers and game designers, with the aim of facilitating player communication without having to interrupt the game.

In the Covid-19 pandemic, Discord became popular beyond the gamer niche, as it was a platform that allowed a simple way to chat with friends and create online communities.

The user has to register to participate in the servers and also maintain individual conversations with other people. In most countries, including Brazil, the terms of use require a minimum age of 13 years.

Discord does not have a continuous timeline, being divided into individual channels, which function as chat rooms, in which the user participates in groups about specific interests.

The operation is similar to that of Facebook groups, in which users can join either servers open to the general public or private servers that require an invitation to join.

Due to the nature of these small private servers, they often lack the moderation or platform oversight that a larger public server would have.

Why is Discord so popular?

Fabio Assolini, director of Kaspersky’s Global Research and Analytics Team, says Discord’s popularity among teens lies in its ease of use, the features it offers, and the building of communities.

“The platform started to become very niche with gamers, attracting a large teenage audience; then many Youtubers and content creators started using Discord servers to strengthen their relationship with their community. It is a very good application for organizing information, where you can automate many of the functions using Bots, higher file sharing limits, being a very versatile platform”, he says.

For him, another factor to be taken into account in the platform’s popularity is the poor moderation of posted content.

“The most popular networks, such as WhatsApp and YouTube, have stronger moderation and are able to remove content quickly, unlike Telegram and Discord, where they stay on air longer.” According to him, this point, the target of lawsuits against Telegram, is also one of Discord’s problems.

Discord has faced controversy over the years regarding harmful content posted on its platform, such as white nationalist organizations organizing the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville in 2017.

The company has beefed up its automated tools to detect harassing or offensive messages, but it also relies on members of its Discord servers to report violations to the company.

How to ensure safe use of Discord?

For Assolini, one of the ways to increase the safety of using the platform is with the use of antivirus that prevents malware or viruses from stealing user data and the use of parental control software to limit the child’s access to the network.

“There are several functions in parental control software that parents can become familiar with and should use to protect their child from accessing these threats,” he says.

A study carried out in Brazil by the cybersecurity company Kaspersky, in partnership with the consultancy Corpa, reveals that 12% of the parents interviewed caught a stranger contacting their children over the internet.

He claims that the young public is the target of this type of crime and guide the teenager to block sites or users that are uncomfortable and unknown are measures that can avoid possible risks of exposure or violence.

“It is necessary to have a good conversation with the teenager, frank and open, for the father to know what the child is doing online, because leaving the child with his device without any supervision is something very risky”, says the director of Kaspersky.