Why in the world would anybody consider deactivating their Kik Messenger account? The Kik Messenger app is a wonderful instant messaging application that allows its millions of users around the world to exchange text messages, photos, videos, and so much more. The app gets better and better all the time, with new features being introduced and older ones being improved almost constantly.
In this article we explore the reasons why anybody could consider deactivating their own Kik Messenger account. We will also explain how you could go about deactivating your account but will also offer alternatives to deactivating the account. As we will explain, there could be many reasons why somebody may wonder if deactivating their account could be the right thing to do. For those people we will offer different alternatives they could consider before taking a step as radical as deactivating their Kik Messenger account.
Someone Has Been Bothering You On Kik
“Children should be able to live a life free from bullying and harassment and it is time that we all took a stand against this.”- Katherine Jenkins
Probably, the most common reason why anybody may consider quitting the Kik Messenger app is because somebody has begun to bother you.
Now, the limits of tolerance you are willing to exercise are entirely up to you but there should be no reason why you should put up for any continuing form of abuse. What follows is a list with some examples of what would be almost universally considered unacceptable online behavior:
- Someone sends you unsolicited naked pictures (commonly referred to as nudes) or any other graphic pictures of an adult nature. What is totally unacceptable is that they continue to do so after you have told them to refrain from sending them, or if you are between 13 and 18 (remember that Kik Messenger users must be at least 13 years old to use the app).
- Someone constantly asks you for personal information. An easy way of avoiding this for ever happening to you is to restrict the people you are willing to chat with on Kik to those you already know from real life. Of course, we know this is less than ideal and it may be defeat the object if you joined Kik Messenger to make new friends and meet new people. If you are comfortable talking to strangers on Kik Messenger, make sure that you are very careful not to give out any personal information or anything that may identify you or anybody close to you. If you are a teenager make sure that you do not give out any information that could identify your parents or any other family members. If someone insists on asking you questions that may lead to identify you, you should probably be a little more than suspicious about them.
- Someone becomes aggressive and threatening. Online bullying is real and we should all be aware of it. And, despite what it is generally thought, it does not just happen to vulnerable teenagers (although teenagers should be specially careful). Bullying should not be tolerated. Do not ever do anything you are not entirely comfortable with.
As we said, you decide how tolerant you would want to be in the face of any of those behaviors but, if you have warned someone once, and they insist with their misbehavior you should be considering what to do next. Although we have been saying “someone”, it is important to notice that some of the above unacceptable behavior may be carried out by a bot rather than by a person. These bots are not the kind of bot that you will find in the Kik bot shop but, instead, bots that have been specifically designed to phish information for genuine human Kik users by pretending to be human themselves.
How to deal with phishing bots? More often than not, phishing bots will send you a link that would redirect you away from the Kik Messenger app to a third party site. Under not circumstance should you ever click on any such links. If you do you would be redirected to a site where you will be asked to provide some personal financial information. If you have clicked on the link by error, do not provide any of this information. If you discover or suspect that you have been chatting to a nefarious bot, you should report it as spam immediately. There is no need to deactivate your account just because you have (almost) fallen victim of a phishing bot. Instead, you should just report them to get rid of them.
There are two ways to report spam.
The first one is directly from your chats:
- Grab your smart phone or mobile device.
- Open the Kik Messenger app.
- Go to the specific chat.
- Tap on the profile icon located in the top right hand corner of the chat screen.
- Then tap on the icon with the vertical dots located in the top right corner of your screen.
- Tap on the report icon.
- From all the different options, pick out the one that says “this is a spam bot”.
- Then decide whether you would like to add your chat history to back up your case or not. If you decide to do so, just check the relevant option.
- Finally, just tap on the “report and block” button.
The second method, on the other hand, allows you to report spam from the “new chats” list:
- Grab your smart phone or mobile device.
- Open the Kik Messenger app.
- Go to chat in question.
- Tap on the ignore icon.
- If you have an iOS device (an iPod or an iPhone), tap on report. If, however, you have an Android device, tap on report and block.
- Then, tap on the “this is a spam bot” option.
- Then decide whether you would like to add your chat history to back up your case or not. If you decide to do so, just check the relevant option.
- Finally, just tap on the “report and block” button.
These two options are just for spam bots. If an actual user is bothering you, you should not report them as spam. Instead, you should block them. It is really not worth it to deactivate your account just because of one individual when you could just block them.
- Grab your smart phone or mobile device.
- Open the Kik Messenger app.
- Tap on settings.
- If you have an iPhone or an Android phone, select chat settings. If, however, you have a Windows Phone, a Symbian, or a Blackberry, select Privacy.
- Pick out block list from all the different options.
- Then tap on the plus (+) icon.
- Choose the person that you would like to block.
- Finally tap on the block icon to confirm.
After this, the person who was bothering you will not be able to contact you again.
Do You Need A Break?
Another reason why some people think about deactivating their account is because they may need a break from the Kik Messenger app. Perhaps, you have exams coming up, or your too busy with work,… There may come a time when you need a little break from the instant messaging app. If that is the case for you, we would suggest temporarily deleting the app from your smart phone. You can then reinstall it eventually once your “break” period is over.
Deleted the app from your smart phone or mobile device will not deactivate your account. So, when you downloading and install it again, the app will remember your login details and your chat history. The only thing you should consider is whether you would like to inform any or all of your Kik Messenger friends of your decision of taking a break. This is because, as long as you have not deactivated your account, they would still be able to contact you and send you messages on Kik even if you have deleted the app. So, to avoid any misunderstandings, you should at least considering letting them know.
How Do You Deactivate Kik Messenger?
If you still decide to go ahead and deactivate your Kik Messenger account you can. You will be able to use the same user name and login details if you decide to re-activate it in the future. However, all your chat history will be deleted. So, before you deactivate your account, it might be worth saving any chats or pictures that you would like to keep.
Once you have done that, the steps to deactivate your account are as follows:
- Grab your smart phone or mobile device.
- Open the Kik Messenger app.
- Tap on settings.
- Choose your account from all the different options.
- Then tap on the reset icon.
- Type in the same email address that you used when you registered.
- Check your email boxes (including the junk inbox) for a deactivation email from Kik. The email will contain a link. Simply click on it to conclude the deactivation process.
In this article we have shown you the most common reasons why people generally consider deactivating their Kik Messenger accounts. We have explained what you could do if you ever find yourself in any such situation, and also what you will ultimately need to do if you do decide to deactivate. Have you ever consider deactivating Kik? If so, please leave a comment below.