As the bank alerts him to a staggering $1200 drained in the dead of night, the father is thrust into a relentless battle against unseen cyber shadows. The story unfolds into a raw, emotional journey of desperation, responsibility, and the fight to shield a child from the unseen dangers lurking behind a screen.
So my daughter (12F) is literally in love with roblox, she plays it everyday with her friends any chance she gets. Obviously my wife and I aren’t happy with this, but she does well enough in school, and has her priorities straight when it comes to education.
One day my daughter came crying to me that her account got hacked by someone on roblox, and that she lost her entire account. I was freaking out because I let her use my CC on the game to buy things (I was with her while she purchased the items).
I did some research, and realized that the game doesn’t save CC information, so I calmed down, helped her make a new account (I asked her if she wanted to reset the password by going thru the email, but she said she just wanted a new account), and all was fine.
A couple days ago, the bank had let me know that there was an enormous amount of strange transactions occurring at odd times during the day (@ like 3AM-6AM, the amount of money spent was $1200 damn dollars), and I had to go through a long and tough process of having to change my CC info, and freezing my account for the time being.
I asked my daughter if this was in anyway related to her roblox account being hacked, and she said no because “how could they if the game itself doesn’t save the CC #?”
I was fooling around on the ipad browsing youtube, when I saw a bunch of recommended videos like ‘*FREE ROBUX* How to GET 1 000 000 ROBUX’, I went through her history and found all these third party shady sites, and how she had been putting her account info onto it.
I also went in to the hacked account by going through her email and resetting the password to find that she had been taking fucking pictures of my CC and the CVV number on the back and asking her friends how to enter the information to use the CC, she had also sent our street address and our postal code.
I absolutely blew up when I saw this, I ran up to her room and gave her probably one of the sternest lectures I have ever given as a parent. I told her that I couldn’t believe she lied to me, she cried and told me she was sorry repeatedly.
I blocked all access from the internet on the iPad, and told her she will no longer be allowed to use anything internet related except for school. I blocked the roblox website itself, and left it at that.
She can no longer use the internet for the time being, but I still allow her to watch TV, talk on the phone with friends, and if she asks, she can go into facetime calls with her friends.
My wife says I need to relax, and that I need to undo this punishment immediately since “I never taught her the danger’s of privacy over the internet” and “because there’s nothing else for her to do during social distancing”.
The thing is, yes, I somewhat agree with that, but she lied to my face about something that was extremely serious, and she went through my wallet to get my CC without my knowledge.
I just can’t let it go. AITA?
Conclusion
The parent is grappling with a significant breach of trust after discovering their 12-year-old daughter not only lied about a hacked account but also misused their credit card information after secretly obtaining it. The central conflict lies between the parent’s need to enforce serious consequences for deceit and theft versus the spouse’s view that the punishment is too severe given the daughter’s age and the current lack of alternative activities.
Was the parent justified in imposing a near-total ban on internet access following the severe breach of trust and financial risk caused by their daughter’s lies and actions, or should the wife’s call for immediate leniency be followed due to the severity of the restriction and the context of social distancing?
Here’s how people reacted:
This is the part of parenting that is difficult. I always hated taking things away from my son. But, you have to sometimes. One thing we would sometimes do is allow our sin to “work off” some of the time he was grounded or a privilege was taken away. So, he could do extra chores or yard work (normal chores didn’t count). It had to be above and beyond. So, he could basically choose to serve hard labor in lieu of time served.
But DUDE! HOW have you and your wife not had a talk about internet safety with a 12 year old? This should have been an ongoing, age-appropriate conversation since she got her first device. I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say you deserved it, but I feel like this may be a fitting lesson to you guys as well as your daughter.
Also, you didn’t mention how long she was grounded for? For the lesson to be effective there needs to be an end-date. Obviously I’m not suggesting she just get her devices back and be sent on her merry way, she should still have restrictions until she can prove that she’s responsible. But to hold this over her indefinitely and not giving her a chance to redeem herself will not help her grow as a person. It could result in bitterness and distrust towards you which might then lead to more sneaking in the future.
Wish you guys all the best! Really tough lesson all around but hopefully you’ll all be better for it.
The rest is exactly as if she’d gone into your wallet without your permission and taken your credit card and used it at the mall to buy stuff she wanted. She did that, but instead of a physical mall, it was a variety of websites. And as per “dumb kid” paragraph above, that’s where the consequences escalated (although certainly CC fraud happens from use at physical outlets too)
Your wife needs to understand that difference – theft and lying vs being dumb on the internet. Your daughter absolutely needs punishment for the theft and lying: clearly explained and for a specific time frame or until certain conditions are met and with you and your wife a united front.
NTA
EDIT1: It’s likely she didn’t spend the $1200 and it was taken by another person, I misread it.
EDIT2: If you were to ground her for a week or 2 with no internet I think that would be more than long enough to drive the point home on the lying and stealing.
EDIT3: Wow, most upvoted comment ever. Guess my advice didn’t suck.
As the mother of an 11yo girl, I’ve learned that it seriously hampers their social life to take their phones and internet access, to a point that’s pretty damaging. I’ve started taking specific apps or putting crazy time limits on them when my kid does something she shouldn’t be doing.
That being said steal card info is a huge issue. You need to talk to her friend’s parents as well. Middle school girls are evil, and they do their evil in groups.
NOT EVEN CLOSE!!! Don’t even focus on the cc info, etc. being out there and God knows what other shit you don’t know about that she did… focus on the lying. And honestly this isn’t as bad as it couldve turned out, use this opportunity to teach her how she could’ve been traced back and kidnapped by some creeper.
Your wife needs to get on board because you have got this 100% correct. Maybe you didn’t properly teach her about the internet but you’ll properly teach her about lying. And THIS can be her lesson on internet danger.
Edit – mom is also an asshole for not having taught their kid about internet privacy and safety.
Yes you need to explain the seriousness of what she did and what happened and what could potentially happen, and why to NEVER TRUST ANYTHING ANYONE SAYS ONLINE EVER. But she’s also 12. You need to bear the majority of responsibility here for securing your own credit cards.
That’s theft, plain and simple. And she knew it was wrong because she lied about it. If she’s old enough to more-or-less understand how CCs work, she’s old enough to understand that there are consequences for her actions. If I had done that with my dad’s CC at the age of twelve, I probably wouldn’t have lived to see thirteen.
I don’t think you wife understands how dangerous your daughter giving out this info can be. Aside from the financial risks of the card being used, a 12 yo has given her street address. I think your wife needs to be educated on the dangers maybe then she will back you up.
This will be a good lesson for your daughter, and if she’s *truly* sorry (and not just sorry she got caught), she’ll accept her penance with minimal complaint.
I assume this isn’t a “until you leave for college” type punishment though. It can’t go on forever.
If yes – NTA.
If not – YTA / ESH. And you’re lucky it was only about money and not about her safety.
My brother did something like this when he was about 10 and no parents reacted the same way. It taught him a serious lesson-the fact that your daughter lied is really concerning.