I wasn't exactly surprised to hear recently that nearly 1 in 5 smartphone owners use their phone for sexting. I'm a big believer that, if used safely and smartly, it can be a fun way to spice up your relationship. The one thing that I'm NOT okay with, though, is teen girls engaging in sexting with boys that they kind of barely know–or that will break their heart after that first naked photo is sent. Oddly enough, there now seems to be a new iPhone app that's actually encouraging teens to sext racy photos of themselves. Gross!
Read more in ¿Qué más? When will teens understand that sexting is not as harmless as they think?
The app, which has been around for about a year, is called Snapchat and it's different than other photo sharing apps because you can control how long your friends view your messages. That's right, the app lets you send a photo to someone and make sure it's deleted after just a few seconds or minutes. Seriously, how does that not sound like it's encouraging sexting?!
That's not even to mention that the app's iTunes page features some very young young girls having what they describe as "instantly fun and insanely playful." Well, I bet some teens are taking that fun a bit too far, thinking that it's innocent to send a sexy photo since it will be deleted instantaneously–except that's not actually true, either!
Read more in ¿Qué más? 10 Teen sexting codes all parents need to know
According to Buzzfeed.com, the design of the app makes photo retention more difficult but it doesn't actually make it impossible since the person you're sending the photo to can just take a screenshot with their camera. Yes, you'd be notified but there's nothing you can do from actually stopping them from ultimately saving your photo. And that's how teen girls are going to fool themselves into thinking that sexting is harmless when it's really, really not. I hope someone tells them about this danger ASAP!
Image via Thinkstock
