Pervasive Group Inc. today announced that MMGuardian, the company’s award-winning parental control app, was instrumental in the arrest of a sexual predator from Georgia planning to abduct a 15-year-old child in Texas. The “Predator Safety Alert” from MMGuardian is one of several alert types generated by the company’s proprietary AI analysis of text and social media messages.
Having driven across several states, the predator expected to meet and abduct the girl at a local parking lot. Instead, he was arrested by the local police and has been charged with two felonies – online solicitation of a minor and attempted trafficking of a minor.
The predator first made contact with the child in the online game Fortnite, but was able to persuade the child to move their communications onto Facebook Messenger to facilitate the grooming process. The mother, aware of the potential risks to children online, had been checking her child’s online gaming account, but unfortunately failed to spot the tell-tale interactions.
On March 28th, the mother received a Predator Safety Alert generated by the MMGuardian application that she had previously installed on her child’s phone. The alert was triggered by the app’s automatic AI-powered analysis of her child’s social media messages. Upon reviewing the reports of her daughter’s messages, she discovered that a 34-year-old man was grooming her daughter.
She then took the child’s device and contacted the local police department. The mother continued the dialogue until authorities were able to take control of the account, the day before the predator had arranged to pick up the child. Pretending to be the daughter, the police arrested and charged the predator on April 2nd.
The mother has confirmed that without MMGuardian, she would never have known about the grooming of her daughter, and said, “I am very grateful for the app because it allowed me to not feel the need to read every single message my daughter had with friends, giving her her privacy while I am also alerted about safety risks.”
MMGuardian constantly improves the deep learning models that is the core of its AI, by means of internal innovation and collaboration with child psychologists, cyber police detectives, schoolteachers, and parents. Other alert types include Suicide & Self-harm, Bullying, Violence, Drugs, and Sexting.
James Zhou, CEO of Pervasive Group, said, “We are incredibly happy that the MMGuardian app has been successful in protecting a young girl from potentially very serious harm. It adds a new chapter to our ten-year-long record of helping parents keeping their children safe using cutting edge technologies, including hundreds of cases of life saving or life changing events like this.”
About Pervasive Group Inc.
Pervasive Group Inc, developers of MMGuardian, is a leading provider of parental control solutions. Its technologies and products help parents protect their children from the risks associated with the use of smartphones and an increasingly online world. For more information, please visit www.mmguardian.com.
Trademark notice: MMGuardian and MMGuardian logo are registered trademarks of Pervasive Group Inc. All other trademarks referenced herein are the property of their respective owners.
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