According to an article in The Guardian this morning, a 12-year-old boy in the UK made more than 900 GBP worth of in-game purchases in FarmVille last month. The child did so without his mother’s knowledge, combining 288 GBP of his own savings with 625 GBP worth of credit on his mother’s credit card to make the purchases. For those of you reading this in the US, that’s nearly $1400 USD.

“The first use of my card was on 14 March,” said the boy’s mother, who wishes to remain anonymous. “I discovered it on the 29th and the card was stopped at that point. Any transactions after that date were already in the system, so what I thought was a 427 GBP spend turned into 625 GBP over the next few days.”

Given that the card was her responsibility, neither Zynga nor her credit card company will refund the money. When confronted about the incident, her son admitted guilt and explained it was because “they had brought out good stuff that I wanted.” HSBC, the mother’s credit card company, said it would consider refunding the balance if she decided to file criminal charges against her son. “Obviously the idea of a stupid farm simulation jeopardising his future earnings is not something that I want to consider,” she said.

Facebook has since removed the child’s account. Whether this was at the behest of the mother or simply because he has violated the age rules of Facebook (13 and older only) remains unclear. Either way, consider this a lesson learned about the dangers of “free” Facebook games and the errant ways of youth.

Ahmed IV wrote:What's it about?