Safety Center

Chatting with strangers is the whole point of OmegleLife. We can't check who anyone is, though, and some people break the rules. This page covers what you can do to protect yourself, what happens when you report someone, and how we deal with the most serious problems.

Practical tips

• Keep personal details to yourself. Your full name, phone number, school, workplace, home town and social media accounts are enough for a stranger to find you.
• Check what your camera shows before you start. Letters with your address, a window with a recognisable view, a school or work uniform and family photos can all give you away.
• Assume you could be recorded. Anyone can screen-record a video chat, and we have no way to stop it. Don't do anything on camera you wouldn't want saved.
• Stay on OmegleLife. If a stranger pushes you to move to another app or a private call, be careful. Once you leave, our Report button and bans can't protect you.
• Never send money, gift cards, crypto, passwords or login codes to someone you met in a chat, whatever story comes with the request.
• Be careful with links. Free users' links appear as plain text, but anyone can still type out an address.
• Remember that people can lie about themselves. The gender filter in Premium uses what people say about themselves, and we don't verify it.
• Leave whenever you want. Press Stop or Esc, then New to find someone else. You don't need a reason.

How reporting works

1. During a chat, or within about a minute after it ends, press Report.
2. Pick the reason that fits best: Nudity / sexual content, Minor (under 18), Harassment / hate, Spam / scam, Violence / illegal, or Other. You can add a note of up to 300 characters.
3. The chat ends for both of you. The other person sees only that the chat ended. We don't tell them who reported them or why.

What happens after a report

When you file a report, we save the last 50 messages from that chat and, for a video chat, one frame from your view of the other person's camera. We also record identifiers for both people, such as session ID, IP address and device hash, so a ban can stick. Apart from reports, we don't store chats at all.

Moderators review reports in order of urgency. Reports about minors and about violence go straight to the top of the queue. If a moderator confirms a problem, they ban the person. A ban can apply to their IP address, device, account or email address, and it can last from one hour to permanently. If several different people report the same person within a short time, our system bans them temporarily without waiting for a moderator.

After you report someone, the matcher won't pair the two of you again for 24 hours. We delete report evidence after 90 days unless we need it longer for a legal case. Because most people chat without an account, we can't send you an update on what happened to your report.

Please keep reports truthful. We limit how many reports one person can file per hour, and we give less weight to reports from people who abuse the button.

Minors: zero tolerance

OmegleLife is for adults aged 18 and over, with no exceptions. We remove and ban anyone we believe is under 18. Any attempt to contact, groom or sexually exploit a minor gets a permanent ban across IP address, device and account.

When a case involves child sexual abuse material or the exploitation of a child, we keep the evidence, ban the people involved and report it to the authorities. For cases connected to the United States, that means the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC). For other countries, it means the relevant national police or cybercrime unit. We cooperate with law enforcement in these investigations.

If you see something like this:

• Report the chat right away with the "Minor (under 18)" reason.
• Don't screenshot, record, download or forward the material, even to prove what happened. Sharing it is a crime in most countries, even when your intentions are good. Our report keeps what investigators need.
• You can also report directly to the NCMEC CyberTipline or, for images found online, to the Internet Watch Foundation.

If someone is blackmailing you

Sextortion is when someone records you or gets intimate images from you, then threatens to share them unless you pay or send more. If it happens to you, it isn't your fault, and these steps help:

• Stop replying, and don't pay. Paying doesn't guarantee they'll delete anything, and they may ask for more.
• Save evidence of the threats: screenshots of their messages, usernames and any payment details they sent. Don't save the intimate images themselves.
• Report them to us, to any other platform where they contacted you, and to your local police.
• If the images show someone under 18, Take It Down from NCMEC can help get them removed from participating sites. Adults can use StopNCII.org.

Your IP address in video chat

Video on OmegleLife uses peer-to-peer WebRTC. Where possible, video goes straight from your browser to the other person's, which keeps calls quick. It also means the other person's device can see your IP address, which can reveal your approximate location and internet provider. An IP address doesn't show your home address, but it is still personal information.

If we turn on relay mode, calls go through our relay server and neither side sees the other's IP address. If you'd rather not take the chance, use a VPN, or use text chat, where messages pass through our server and the other person can't see your IP. The Privacy Policy has the details.

Look after yourself

If a chat leaves you upset, take a break. If someone tells you they plan to hurt themselves, encourage them to contact local emergency services or a crisis line, then report the chat so we can look at it. If you think someone is in immediate danger, call your local emergency number.

For safety concerns that aren't about a single chat, email [email protected]. Our Community Guidelines list what is and isn't allowed.