After 14 years of pairing users anonymously over a webcam, the popular chat platform Omegle has succumbed to claims of abuse from users.
The site's popularity grew rapidly upon its launch in 2009 and during the COVID-19 pandemic but has since faced a swathe of controversy, including being subject to more than 50 cases of paedophilia in the past two years, the BBC reported.
Omegle founder Leif K-Brooks said the website was "no longer sustainable, financially nor psychologically".
"There can be no honest accounting of Omegle without acknowledging that some people misused it, including to commit unspeakably heinous crimes," admitted Brooks in a letter published on its homepage.
The Omegle closure comes a few days after it settled a high-profile US lawsuit with a person alleging the platform matched her with a Canadian paedophile, in his late 30s, who pressured her into becoming a digital sex slave over a three-year period, starting when the victim was 11-years-old.
Ryan Scott Fordyce, the offender in this case, was found guilty of exploitation and was sentenced to prison in 2021.
The BBC reported the website had about 73 million visitors per month as of February.
