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Alan Robles

Philippine police have foiled a school shooting and rescued seven students radicalised by “foreigners” online to stage an attack in Laguna province near Manila, amid growing calls for stronger parental safeguards against digital threats.
Officers rounded up the suspects – five boys and two girls, aged 12 to 17 – on February 2 after receiving a tip-off about an alleged plot they intended to carry out a fortnight later, the Philippine Star reported.
The teens, who were turned over to social workers, had come into contact with their “foreign” handlers on the gaming platform Roblox. The handlers subsequently invited the students to private chat rooms, exposing them to videos of shootings, beatings, accidents and beheadings, according to national broadcaster GMA’s Resibo programme.
The indoctrination prompted one of the boys to post a message reading “I will burn down my school” on social media.
Phones seized from the group revealed photos of tactical vests, gloves and an assault rifle that police said the teens were being urged to buy.
Police also found images related to Hitler, as well as T-shirts bearing phrases such as “No Lives Matter” and other slogans associated with the gunmen behind the Columbine High School massacre in 1999 and a 2018 mass shooting at a school in Crimea.
Brigadier General Wilson Asueta, acting director of the Philippine National Police Anti-Cybercrime Group, said the students were close to executing their plan and that the “only thing they lacked was weapons”.
“[We call on parents] to constantly guard their children who are always on the internet, especially those involved in platform gaming … there are players there you don’t know,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

Carlos Nazareno, a game developer and digital rights advocate at Democracy.Net.PH, told This Week in Asia that “parents need to educate children on the very dangers of the internet in a way that fosters trust”, adding that safety should be taught before children were allowed online.
The warning follows reports from Western intelligence agencies that extremists are using platforms such as Roblox and Discord to “recruit and train new conscripts”.
Last October, Unicef reported that nearly nine in 10 children in middle- and upper-income countries played online games – an environment “increasingly exploited by violent organisations, ranging from non-state armed groups in conflict-affected settings to hybrid criminal networks”.
“Minors have impressionable minds”, Nazareno said, adding that this made far-right indoctrination and radicalisation a real threat through social networks, online forums and multiplayer games, which Islamic State and al-Qaeda have used for recruitment.
The mother of one suspect told Resibo that she had been unaware of her son’s online habits – he was hooked on mobile games – until officers arrived at her home and informed her he had been talking to “dangerous” people and accessing videos of school shootings and gun manufacturing.
“They were watching videos of violent personalities,” Asueta said. “One famous mass murderer, those involved in odious crimes.”
Youths could “acquire behaviour tantamount to nihilistic violence” via exposure to such material, he said, adding that police would discuss taking down the platforms with local internet service providers.

On Wednesday, the Philippine Department of Information and Communications Technology and the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Centre said that “Roblox is now formally on notice”, demanding its full cooperation with authorities to avoid a potential suspension in the Philippines.
Nazareno called the response “ridiculous” as bad actors will always find alternate channels.
“At the rate the DICT is going, the Philippines will be a dystopian surveillance and censorship society under the helm of its current head,” he said.
He warned that cyber safety laws being pushed by the government could harm children, particularly proposals requiring citizens to register with real names or verify identities on social media.
“There are many bad people on the internet and … These proposals are very dangerous for minors,” Nazareno said.
“Children need to be taught to value the importance of privacy online and not to give away information about themselves unless absolutely necessary.”


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The case involving radicalised students in Laguna province highlights the need for cyber safety and parental vigilance, analysts say


The case involving radicalised students in Laguna province highlights the need for cyber safety and parental vigilance, analysts say.


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Roblox

Philippine police thwart Roblox-linked school shooting plot by 7 teens

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The case involving radicalised students in Laguna province highlights the need for cyber safety and parental vigilance, analysts say

The case involving radicalised students in Laguna province highlights the need for cyber safety and parental vigilance, analysts say