Spyware can check ‘if your son is gay’

A French security company has been criticised for claiming that parents could use its spyware program to check whether their son is gay.

Fireworld said in an online article that parents could use its “invisible PC spy software” to see whether their son had visited gay internet forums. The company also suggested parents should look for “clues” by hacking into their son’s Facebook account.

Other clues included being shy, liking female singers and preferring reading and theatre to football.

The site adds: “If your son is gay you may never be grandparents and you will not have the happiness of knowing your grandchildren. If your child is gay, he can not help it because it is not a choice on his part”.

The article was spotted by a French gay rights group, and criticised by French secretary of state for equality Marlène Schiappa. She said it showed that “homophobia and sexism have their roots in the same gender stereotypes. We will fight them together”.

Fireworld later removed the article, saying it regretted “not having reflected on the consequences of this type of content”. It apologised to anyone who “may have felt offended”.

It’s actually illegal in France to install software on someone else’s computer in order to spy on it.

Fireworld urges its customers to comply with the law, but claims that using its software to “make sure that your children are not endangering themselves on the internet or on social networks, comes closer to being legal”.