A warning spreading online claims “Momo” has “hacked Fortnite” and can appear on the screen as a “skin” while being able to contact players.
Momo is a fictional character from an Internet meme of 2018 and 2019. We have previously discussed the Momo Challenge in our post here.
Of course, Momo isn’t a real person or individual, and while according to the meme there is a specific set of violence-themed challenges that are posed to people who contact her – called the Momo Challenge – no such specific set of challenges really exist.
With that said, of course, the Momo Challenge has been embraced and embellished by a number of pranksters and scammers on the Internet willing to proliferate the online legend. There are also a number of reported cases of children seeing inappropriate content or being sent inappropriate messages by those willing to spread the meme, or by those engaging in cyber bullying. As such, the Momo Challenge is certainly a demonstration as to why it is important for parents to supervise young children using the Internet, block platforms that can provide adult content and keep an open pathway of communication between parent and child.
However, among the many articles providing sensible advice, we often see warnings that seem determined to provide misleading and sensationalist “advice” in the form of warnings with the aim to panic and misinform readers. The claim that “Momo” has “hacked Fortnite” seems to be one such baseless warning.
WARNING
TO ALL PARENTS
MOMO IS NOW ON FORTNITE AND HAS HACKED INTO THE GAME AND IS TALKING TO CHILDREN THROUGH THEIR HEADSETS MY FRIENDS LITTLE BOY HAS JUST HAD IT HAPPEN TO HIM AND HE SAID IT WAS TELLING HIM TO DO SUICIDAL STUFF TO HIMSELF AND NOT TO TELL HE PARENTS AND ALSO IT COME UP ON THE SCREEN AS A SKIN AND WAS ALL DRESSED IN BLACK AND COVERED IN BLOOD PLEASE SHARE
The claim that “Momo” has now “hacked” into the video game Fortnite is simply a demonstration that the author of the message has no real understanding of how the Internet (or cyber security) really works, and instead is presenting a rather “Hollywood-ised” version of hacking.
As we stated above, “Momo” isn’t a real individual, rather an Internet phenomenon associated with pranksters and cyber-bullying. As such, “she” can’t hack into any game. The majority of baseless warnings we’ve seen associated with Momo are the ones that try and paint the fictional character as possessing special qualities such as the seemingly godlike ability to “hack” into games or computers at will. This is no doubt a symptom of too many horror movies, but real life doesn’t present itself in such a way.
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Fortnite is one of the most popular video games of 2018 and 2019, owned by experienced software developers Epic Games. There is no evidence that the game has been “hacked” in any way, much less by an Internet meme. Additionally, users cannot create their own in-game “skins” (these are outfits worn by the characters in the game) and while it is possible for those playing the game to speak to strangers, this setting can be easily turned off in the audio settings, should parents not want their children connecting with strangers – certainly good advice for younger children playing the game. (A tip from one of our experts is that you can create private parties when playing on certain consoles like the PS4, meaning you only connect with accepted friends.)
While we reiterate that while many are indeed using the Momo Challenge viral meme to their own ends, posting baseless and sensationalist warnings like the one above doesn’t help anyone.
Again, you can read our full article on the viral Momo Challenge in our post here.