“I used you.”

“So was last night only a game for you? B@#$%.”

“I have other ways to get sexual favours. Ha, ha!”

This is an exchange on a social networking site between two 14-year-old schoolgirls who live in upscale Mumbai. It may have been a joke with sexual overtones or it could have been a public pow wow. But what Mona and Tarini (not their real names) didn’t know was that the conversation was visible to complete strangers.

An outsider looking for more can click on a folder (titled sexxxx) in Mona’s picture profile and catch the duo in a dirty dancing pose, grinning at the camera. The two teenagers are enjoying their moments of fun now, but experts warn that these very images and exchanges can return to haunt them.

The two are a part of a growing number of young students — some as young as eight — who are logging on to the Net to their detriment. Some are walking into traps of blackmailers and porn sites by baring their souls — and occasionally parts of their bodies — to so-called friends on social networking sites. There have been cases of children’s pictures being put on X-rated sites. Youngsters have complained about being stalked with sex talk or being flooded with obscenities on networking sites.

A 2008 study on Internet-assisted sexual violence against children and adolescents conducted by Tulir, a Chennai-based support group for survivors of incest, shows that 42 per cent of respondents have been plagued by sex chats — on online chat rooms or website chat applications; 32 per cent of these were girls.

Vidya Reddy, executive director of Tulir, has come across many cases of the very young logging on to the Net without being aware of the consequences. A group of six girls, she says, found that their pictures posted on a social networking site had been lifted by a pornography site, where they were described as lesbians.

In cyber crime, the attacker is often a known person, though not necessarily a friend, says Dr M. Sudhakar, assistant commissioner of police (ACP) and head of Chennai’s cyber crime cell. “Many of the culprits are ex-boyfriends,” adds ACP Sanjay Bhati, head of Delhi’s cyber crime cell.

But those are dire cases. More often than not, those indulging in such acts are students themselves. There have been complaints about boys hacking their classmates’ accounts. In many cases, though, these very boys have had their accounts hacked into when they were in their early teens by older students.

Siddhi Mehta, a 13-year-old student at the Dhirubhai Ambani School in Mumbai, says an older male friend hacked into her Facebook account after a fight with her, threatening to make her private entries public. Mumbai student Karan Saraogi, 12, says a senior wrote “adult stuff” on his Facebook page.

Such incidents are on the rise with children’s access to the Net increasing over the years. A new study conducted by the Associated Chambers of Commerce & Industry (Assocham), the apex chamber of commerce, in 10 Indian cities — including Calcutta — has found that 52 per cent of children surveyed in the 8-11 age group spend more than five hours on the Internet.

According to Dr Deepak Ugra, president of the Indian Academy of Pediatrics, surfing the Internet more than two hours daily could be termed Internet addiction. And like any addiction, it leads to long-term problems. “Over-exposure to the Net is taking away young people’s interest in life. In the long run, it will definitely affect their commitment level in relationships,” adds Nilanjana Goswami, assistant director, Anisha Counselling Centre, Calcutta.

But the young are not bothered about the problems they may face in the future. Right now, the Net is a platform for fun. In fact, social networking sites are so popular that many children have multi-accounts. Eight-year-old Hridaansh Saraogi, for instance, has six accounts on Facebook — “three for me, one for my dog, one for my grandmother and one for my (housing) society.”

When the Internet became popular in India in the late 1990s, parents of college students were worried about their access to pornography sites, a worry that parents of teenagers faced some years down the line. Today, counsellors are concerned about the very young. Goswami says she finds small children accessing porn sites. “They’re curious about sex and don’t know whom to ask.”

But it’s not just sex that parents and counsellors are worried about. For many small children, Internet sites also translate into violent games. Every evening, Anmol Choksey, an eight-year-old Mumbai boy, gets ready to work for a “bad” guy in the military, who “uses military powers to do wrong.”

In his favourite online game, the kid with Popeye peering out of his T-shirt steals from warehouses, hides in barracks and kills anybody who dares to cross his virtual path. The more he’s chased by police cars, the more stars he gets. “The reward is £4 million,” he says.

With great relish he talks of the “fountain of blood” that squirts out of his virtual fiend, as he shoots him in the neck. “If you kill, you get helicopters, cars and money. You get lots of money to kill people,” he says.

The game, while equating money with violence, also undermines the role played by friends. “You help your friend, but if he gets richer than you, you just kill him and get his limousine and Ferrari,” smiles nine-year-old Heet Sadani.

These games, says Aryan Agarwal, 12, allow him to do what he cannot do in real life. “If I’m angry with someone, I can punch the guy or push him out of the car and take the car,” he says.

Parents try to counsel their children, but it doesn’t always work. Gurgaon-based Anupama Purohit, who recently resigned from a publishing house, says efforts to warn her brand new teen, Ameya, to watch his back when online have failed. “I’m always either guilty (‘you’re not my real mom’) or gullible (‘you don’t understand, mom’),” she says.

Parents, clearly, are concerned about child abuse. Paedophiles trawling the Net are known to pose as children and lure them in an act called grooming, warns Mumbai paediatrician Samir Dalwai. “They keep talking to them and drawing the kids to themselves,” Dr Dalwai adds.

Not everybody, however, is anxious about the impact of the Net. Delhi resident Tulika Syed trusts her tech savvy son, Iman, 13. The games that he and his 10-year-old brother play are “educative” she says. The computer is in the children’s bedroom, and occasionally Syed checks to see what they have been logging on to. “But I trust him. I know he’s not cheating.”

The parents of a 13-year-old Mumbai boy thought they had nothing to worry about too — till he got hooked on to a pornography site, which he’d stumbled upon while playing online games. “He felt unwanted by his parents, who were both working. It was his way of creating another world for himself,” says Mumbai counsellor Abhilasha Rawat who treated the boy.

Rawat warns that children who are exposed to sex and violence can face serious problems years later. “In the long run, such exposure can lead to indiscriminate sexual activity, exhibitionism and psychotic issues,” she says. “Many youngsters who frequent porn sites act out what they see with their partners.”

Very few parents, Rawat says, are aware of what their children are up to when they are online. By the time some of them find out, it may be too late.