A Christchurch mother was shocked after a set of walkie-talkies bought from Kmart for her children was interrupted by a man making lewd noises and sexualised comments. Photo / Supplied
A Christchurch mother was shocked after a set of walkie-talkies bought from Kmart for her children was interrupted by a man making lewd noises and sexualised comments. Photo / Supplied
A Christchurch mum is warning other parents to monitor their kids’ toy walkie-talkies after receiving unwanted communications from an unknown man making moaning sounds and talking suggestively about sausages.
The mother-of-two, who wished to remain anonymous, had bought the toys from Kmart as Christmas presents.
She said she was making dinner when she noticed strange sounds from the other end of her house.
“I went down to my children’s bedroom and saw my kid’s walkie-talkie on his bed, and the noises were clearly coming from there, and the man was making sexual moaning sounds over the walkie-talkie.”
“Clear sexual innuendos, just saying things like ‘Do you like sausages? I’m gonna come over, you’re gonna cook my sausage and I’m gonna make you eat it. Mmmm, I’m coming for you. I’m coming over to you now’. It went on for a good few minutes,” she said.
The concerned mother said she was unable to switch the toy off.
“From the moment the kids started playing with the walkie-talkie, the on button just was permanently stuck on. So I was just running around the house trying to find a screwdriver so I could get the batteries out, and, of course, the children were hearing it.”
Concerned about where the chat was coming from — and how close the sender was to her home, she locked the doors.
Kmart sells the $19 walkie-talkie set that the Christchurch mother purchased for her sons, unaware that others could access the same frequency. Photo / Paul Taylor
“On the packaging, it states that there’s a 300m maximum distance with the walkie-talkies. My initial concern was that there must be someone within 300m of our house saying stuff.”
The Christchurch woman then rang police — who eased her fears, at least to the possible proximity of the man.
“They explained that with someone else if they have a stronger frequency radio they could be further away and still send you a message, but you just wouldn’t be able to reply to them,” she said.
Police also suggested changing the frequency of the walkie-talkies.
“But the problem is that it’s set to one radio channel, so you can’t change the channel on it.”
Police confirmed to the Herald they had received the report on December 30 — but without any lines of enquiry identified, it wasn’t possible to carry out further investigation.
The mother of two young boys also alerted Kmart.
“They were really good. They passed me on to a second level of complaints services, and the man sounded really shocked and appalled and said he had lodged an official complaint against the product,” she said.
“Toy-grade walkie-talkies conform to public UHF CB radio standards. They are designed to operate within a limited frequency range, with a preset channel, not allowing users to switch. Occasional interference is not a defect in the product itself,” a spokesperson said.
“Like any communication devices provided to children, we recommend parents exercise discretion and supervise how their children use the device.”
The woman said police also suggested she post about her experience to a relevant social media platform to warn others who had bought the product.
“My agenda wasn’t at all for parents to start throwing out their kids' toys. It was more just to raise awareness,” she said.
Her post had drawn hundreds of comments on social media — some from others who’d had similar experiences.
“As a toy that is marketed at children, it should have some sort of warning on it. Especially when it very much does incur a possibility of something like that happening,” she said.
