Rival companies have accused Microsoft of cynical commercialism for pulling the plug on its internet chatrooms.
The company posted messages on thousands of its chatrooms on Wednesday telling users that the services will be withdrawn on October 14.
MSN — the internet arm of Bill Gates’s Microsoft empire — said it took the decision after a series of high-profile cases involving children being abused by adults they had met in internet chatrooms.
The move was welcomed by children’s charities, but other providers of internet services condemned it. The announcement was seen by some analysts and on online message boards as having more to do with business and revenues than a moral crusade
Alex Kovach, managing director of Lycos United Kingdom and Ireland, said the move was “irresponsible”, and added that the industry should be focusing on how to provide a safe environment for chatting.
“People leading the internet should be moving towards regulated chatrooms,” he said. “But people like Microsoft are creating risks by turning their back on chat and putting their head in the sand.”
He said that chatrooms are here to stay.
“Our chatrooms have 100 supervisors in the UK, we have records of internet providers’ addresses and we are Home Office compliant,” he said. “People should be working together to make it a safer environment rather than abandoning it altogether.”
Kovach said there were commercial motives behind Microsoft’s decision.
“Microsoft is finding it difficult to make money from chat and is moving people towards instant messaging, which has a better ability to make money,” he said. “Yet they have claimed the moral high ground. Really, this is missing the point.”
Freeserve, another UK internet service provider, also accused Microsoft of cloaking a commercial decision with concern for child welfare.
“We are bemused that MSN has managed to pull off something of a PR coup with this announcement, giving the impression of being respectable and responsible,” it said in a statement.
“Our view is that what they are doing is nothing short of reckless. All MSN is doing is sending chatroom users underground. MSN’s one million-plus chatroom users are not going to stop using chat. MSN is simply moving the problem elsewhere.”
Freeserve requires all chatroom users to register with it, so it knows who they are. There are moderators in chatrooms for younger users.
Virgin.net, which closed its chatrooms two years ago, was more cautious. Peter Tuomey, its sales and marketing director, said: “We felt it was the responsible thing to do to move away from chatrooms. Even in moderated chatrooms there is no visibility, so you can’t see who [a person] is chatting to.”
MSN said it had invested for years in moderators and also had a dedicated child protection officer, but that the level of abuse was such that it could no longer guarantee children’s safety.
Gillian Kent, MSN UK’s director, said: “We felt it necessary to make these changes because online chat services are increasingly misused. These changes will help protect MSN users from spam and inappropriate communication.”
In the United States, MSN’s unmoderated chatrooms will have access through credit-card subscription only. There are moderated chatrooms in Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Brazil. But MSN’s chatrooms in the Middle East, Latin America, Asia and Europe will close. — Guardian Unlimited Â