Social networking site linked to cyberbullying, suicides
More Canadian youth are using a new social networking website flagged by Cybertip as a source of cyberbullying and linked to a handful of teen suicides.
The website, Ask.fm, is popular around the world with nearly 57 million users but Cybertip.ca, Canada's national tipline for reporting online sexual exploitation of children, has already received about a dozen complaints from parents.
Unlike Facebook and Twitter, which provide privacy setting options, Ask.fm profiles are public and people can ask questions anonymously.
Skye Spence, 17, tried the site out for a month but didn't like the negativity on it.
"It was alright for the first few weeks and then soon enough people started to progress and ask me questions, whether I was a virgin and asking personal questions," he said.
"I'm an aboriginal person so I've [also] been asked, you know, why am I such a dirty native."
