Greetings,

In line with our brand philosophy, we spread the message of MXit through word-of-mouth and viral communication. We have taken the stand that we do not give live interviews.
Should it be necessary for MXit to clarify their standpoint on a particular issue we will release a statement to the media, at our discretion.

Should you have any press queries, please contact press@mxit.com.

We invite all journalists, should you feel the need to query any hoax messages, rumours or anything you feel that needs to be brought to our attention that is going around MXit you are more than welcome to do so by posting here.

For latest MXit gossip click here Gossip Column

Regards,
MXit_PressRoom

Legal amendment to protect minor chatters


MXit responds:
We have very little knowledge of the proposed amendments beside the statements of Iyaver Chetty when the article was first published in The Daily News, 29 July 2008.
Legal amendment to protect minor chatters

Our response to these statements appears below:

Daily News:
According to the board's acting CEO, Iyaver Chetty, on Monday said he was very concerned after reading the disturbing news about "### lists" and "bastard lists" being circulated in MXit chat rooms.

MXit comment:
No list can be circulated in MXit chatrooms as it is technically impossible to do so using the MXit software. A list (in the form of a message), once received as a message from someone you know (you can only receive messages from someone you know and who you have added as a contact), can be forwarded to all your contacts, which are people you as a MXit user have voluntarily added as contacts.

Daily News:
He said if the amendments to the Film and Publication Act were passed on Friday, the board would be one step closer in its fight to protect children under the age of 18 from such untoward activities taking place in chat rooms.

MXit comment:
Is Mr Chetty saying that due to the criminal behavior of a handful of people, the privacy of millions of our users should be violated? We thought that this type of censorship was something of the past ?
Analogy: telephones (mobile and fixed lines) are daily used in crimes does that give authorities the right to listen to all telephone conversations NO!

Daily News:
In a report in the Sunday Tribune Herald, the girls and boys named on the "### list" and "bastard list", some as young as 14, are accused of leading promiscuous lifestyles.

It is unclear how the lists first originated, but they are apparently being spread through MXit using the freestyler application, a means of forwarding messages similar to the e-mail system. Some lists are said to have the girls' telephone numbers on them.

Chetty said while many chat rooms, especially ones used by children, had some form of monitoring, the providers of these chat rooms were not legally obliged to monitor them.

MXit comment:
So we remedy the symptom and not the cause is what Iyaver Chetty is saying. We think he is on the wrong track. A much better solution is to catch the culprits, prosecute them and make an example out of them as they have violated the rights of other citizens. We have assisted authorities numerous times in solving various problems and will continue to do so.

MXit 'an easy route to crime' 01/08/2008 09:21 - (SA) by Hilda Fourie, Beeld

http://www.news24.com/News24/South_Afri ... 19,00.html

The response by MXit to questions by Ms Hilda Fourie - quite different to what was printed! :

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: I have an enquiry regarding comment that was made by Mike Bolhuis, a private investigator from Pretoria, that says Mxit is dangerous and a way for people to get personal information on people that usually leads to crime. "There by a lot of kids go missing after they have met people on mxit."

MXit Answered: Many things in life are dangerous if not used according to certain rules or laws. We all know cars were invented with a noble idea in mind, but, are involved directly and indirectly in the killing of millions of people around the world. They are also used by criminals around the world to commit the most heinous crimes.
To say MXit is dangerous is like saying cars are dangerous and should be avoided. We have nearly nine million people using MXit and the majority (millions) of them are using it as a free way to stay in contact with loved ones, family, friends " not only locally but globally. We are doing a great service to the community in providing the software for free and allowing the free sending and receiving of messages, pictures, sound clips etc. Is there a danger in this ? most certainly not. On MXit you can only receive messages from people you have allowed to be your contacts unlike, SMS and MMS where you can receive a message from anyone.

Chatrooms are a very small part of MXit and are used by people to meet or chat with people they don't know. There are millions and millions of chatrooms which have been around for more than a decade in the internet world. Revealing personal details in any chatroom (not only a MXit chatroom) is dangerous and we remind our users all the time not to do so. As a matter of fact, every time someone enters a chatroom, we remind them not to reveal personal information. Unfortunately they do not see this as a danger and to connect to my analogy again - it is like saying to a person, please do not drink and drive but he/she ignores your warning.
The question is, who is to blame if an accident happens? The car manufactures for making fast and unsafe cars? The government for not imposing stricter laws and enforcement thereof? the road builders for not making roads wider and safer ?? I am afraid not the person responsible is the drunken or inconsiderate driver. Can we force t our users not to reveal personal information we have zero chance of success.
Should we stop chatrooms? The users will just go somewhere else where there is no warning message in most of the cases.
The second part of Mr Bolhuis comment is incorrect in saying that it usually leads to crime. We receive numerous 'thank-you' notes on a continual basis from people who heeded our warning not to reveal personal information, met on MXit chatrooms, then met in person and eventuallyt married.

Question: According to Bolhuis, the criminals using MXit always use a false identity.

MXit Answered: That is possible but with the technology available to the telecommunications industry in general, a false identity is not much protection.

Question: Please comment on the involvement of Mxit in criminal activities?

MXit Answered: We don't have all the details but we have assisted the authorities a number of times in tracking down criminals. Looking at the size of our user base and the number of criminal enquiries from the authorities, the percentage of enquiries to users does not even register . As with any technology, we are certain that criminals will use whatever is available to commit crimes. Can we stop them ? - this is virtually impossible.

Question: What security measures do you have in place to make sure that identities that is on Mxit is actually truthful and not a way for criminals to get personal information from people, which are normally the first step for that person to be a victim of crime

MXit Answered: Firstly, we cannot verify the true identity and age of any user as a MXit user connects through the internet to us and since he/she can have multiple prepaid sim cards, there is no real record of who this person is. The fact that users do not have to reveal any personal information when buying a prepaid sim card is not helping this problem either. The problem of authenticating someone on the internet is the single biggest problem on the internet and will be for many years to come.

MXit will never reveal any personal information about anyone unless ordered to do so by a judge via a subpoena.
Every MXit account is protected by a user-chosen password and if that password is sufficiently secretive, no one can gain access to that account without the relevant password. We urge users to select long passwords and actually forcethem not to use easy passwords such as 111111 or 000000.
The only way for someone (criminal or not) to gain personal information about users on MXit is if they themselves reveal that information. Can we stop users from doing this? If they do not adhere to our warnings, we have no chance in winning the battle.

Greetings,

Please click Mixed Up About MXit

Regards,
MXit_PressRoom

Urgent press statement – Friday, August 07, 2009

MXit calls for accurate reporting

MXit is calling on the media to stop misusing its name in what the company believes is a dangerous trend to sensationalise headlines.

The mobile social networking giant, with close to 15 million global users, is concerned about the ongoing misleading and inaccurate use of its name in media reports across all media platforms, including television, print and online. MXit is currently consulting its lawyers to determine whether the most recent example is a breach of the South African Press Code, or indeed if it amounts to defamation.

In the latest example, media reports claim that MXit is responsible for a teenage girl from Johannesburg disappearing for 48 hours after telling her school that she would not be attending classes. Her parents allege that she may have met someone on MXit. The school is considering disciplinary action on the girls return and although the case is being investigated, there is no proof that a conversation with an unknown person on MXit led to the girl’s disappearance.

MXit has contacted Parktown Girls’ High school, and a MXit representative will be speaking to both teachers and students about responsible social networking next week.

“We cannot condone this behaviour or attack on our brand and are simply calling on the media to be accurate in their reporting and headlining of stories. MXit is not the problem. We offer a system that allows people to communicate at a fraction of the cost of sending sms or voice calls. Our users send approximately 35 000 messages per second during peak times and the MXit community visits our platform more than 20 million times a day. Even if it does emerge that she accepted a friend request from a stranger, it is not fair to condemn a technology of close to 15 million users for bad choices made by one user,” says Juan du Toit, international marketing manager for MXit.

“Whilst eTV was covering the missing girl story during its newscast at 7pm on Wednesday, they flashed a web address for a European teen pornography site during the newscaster’s report. This is simply unacceptable. There is no connection between MXit and these sites and we are horrified that prime time news would even show a web address of this nature. Our philosophy is firm – we never promote or distribute any content that reflects any political, religious or pornographic view and even restrict advertising from popular consumer magazines that could be seen as even slightly “risky”. eTV’s actions were inappropriate and unethical,” adds Du Toit.

MXit has an obligation to ensure that its users understand that media reports are not entirely true in this case and has sent a message to its community which reflects the facts:

NOTICE: MXit SAYS NO TO POOR JOURNALISM! We condemn the unprofessional and sensation-seeking journalism displayed by e-TV and The Star newspaper this last week. Both news channels in some way blame MXit for the disappearance of the Parktown Girls High teen. E-TV ran this story Wednesday night, displaying a pornographic website as a backdrop to its news report – totally unacceptable as we will never promote pornography. The Star also ran articles that left readers believing that MXit is to blame. MXit is not responsible for the disappearance of this girl. We want to warn all users again to enjoy our technology with the necessary responsibility and level of maturity; and never to reveal personal information. We challenge both media owners to get these simple facts accurate, and to properly understand our technology. Can we trust what is reported?

“We take great care in ensuring that our users are consistently warned to use our network responsibly, to only accept contacts from people that they know and to never reveal their personal information,” adds Du Toit.

In addition to strict security measures for its users, MXit has also developed guidelines to help empower parents.

“We offer a technology that allows users to communicate in a secure and inexpensive way. Although we understand that technology is sometimes difficult for parents to understand, we believe that they need to take responsibility for teaching their teenagers how to engage responsibly on all communications platform. We have a chat room blocking feature that allows parents to shut down the chat room capability if they believe their teens are interacting inappropriately,” says Du Toit.

Numerous parents have downloaded the MXit application so that they understand the technology and therefore able to appropriately advise and guide their teenagers. MXit believes that this is the most sensible thing a parent could do. “Knowledge is power,” says Du Toit. “It is only when you understand something completely that you are able to use it to your advantage, and we urge parents to take the time to understand any social networking platform that their teens use.”

MXit on protecting its users and guidelines for parents:

MXit has the following security measures in place to protect its users:

1. Moderators are on duty to respond to any complaints.
2. MXit recently launched its chat room blocking feature that allows parents to block the chat capability on MXit.
3. Users are encouraged to report any abuse they may have experienced on MXit. This can be done on MXit by sending a “.rat” command to MXit. This command gives MXit the authority to see the last 30 string of this conversation from reporting. A moderator will then investigate within 6 to 12 hours of reporting.
4. MXit has a strict policy not to reveal personal details about its users to other users . Personal information can only be exchanged by users who delibralatey opted to do that despite MXit’s wanrning that it could be dangerous.
5. Chat rooms contain profanity filters, and most are age restricted too. You can also set up your own chat room, and password protect it, so the only way that someone can gain access to a chat room is if the user invites them in.
6. Every time a user enters a chat zone he or she is reminded to keep all personal details private.
7. A user’s identity remains anonymous when he or she is in a dynamic chat zone.
8. MXit suspends or bans users that abuse its technology and will continue to assist authorities to stop abusers of its network.

MXit has always stressed the importance of education and responsible online behavior in a technological advancing world. In addition to the safety regulations that is constantly reminding its users of, it has also developed a set of guidelines for parents, available on its website: http://www.mxit.com

Guidelines for parents:

1. Understanding the environment in which your child communicates is of utmost importance, so install MXit. You wouldn’t let your child stay over at a friends’ house without getting to know the family, so spend some time on MXit so that you understand where your child is interacting.
2. Have an open and honest discussion with your child. Tell them about the potential dangers and ask them to tell you if they ever feel that someone is not who they say they are (teens are switched on to this).
3. Allocate the amount of time your child can spend on MXit and use your mobile to monitor this.
4. If you notice that your child’s time on MXit suddenly drops, check to see if he / she has a secret phone (it could simply mean that they are out of airtime, but check nevertheless).
5. Check your child’s contact list regularly and follow up if with them if there is anyone that you don’t feel comfortable with.
6. Constantly remind your child (every day if you need to) not to hand out their personal information on MXit.
7. Tell your child that he / she should never, under any circumstances, agree to a private offline chat with a stranger.
8. Help your child understand that they should never forward or post pictures that could cause embarrassment if passed on.
9. If your child fails to heed your warnings and advice, simply install the chat room blocking feature. The educational route is advisable, as children will always find another way to communicate, whether or not on MXit.

Ends

Issued by:
FD Beachhead
Sandra Sampayo

MXit declares war on porn and cyber criminals

MXit today announced a zero-tolerance policy against offenders who abuse its online community. Anyone posting explicit or offensive material in public areas within MXit will from now on be banned from its systems without warning. “For too long, a group of less than 0.1% of our user base has tarnished our reputation with their continual abuse of our community through unsavoury, and sometimes criminal, behaviour”, say Herman Heunis, CEO and founder of MXit. “Until very recently, we had great difficulty in identifying and tracking these degenerates, but with new developments we are now in a situation where they leave a definite electronic footprint.

“Our users’ right to privacy is and will always be of paramount importance. We have no intention of imposing censorship on communication between users as their privacy is a constitutional right, just like private communication via letters, SMS, MMS, e-mails and other mediums. However, when someone publishes offensive content or uses our platform to prey on innocent people, we shall remove them from our system. Furthermore, any suspicious behaviour indicating possible criminal intention will be handed over to the Cybercrime Unit of the SAPS as currently required by law.

Our foremost responsibility is to protect our 19+ million registered user base that makes up our community, and as such, we will do everything in our power to identify these offenders and help the authorities bring them to book,” says Heunis.

“Lastly, I want to strongly urge users never to exchange personal information with strangers, and certainly not to meet them in person. Inviting strangers to be your friend on MXit, or any other social network for that matter, is exactly the same as opening your front door without knowing who is on the other side. It just isn’t smart,” concludes Heunis.