Michigan State Police Detective Lt. Thomas Kish stated that predators view video games as a "foot in the door" to get access to children, adding that "child predators are migrating from traditional methods to alternate media."

"They are going to places where children are," Kish noted.

The report makes note of several instances in which predators employed online games such as Blizzard's World of Warcraft (PC) to meet children, and another instance in which a man sent a 10-year-old boy explicit video via Xbox Live while playing Bungie's Halo 3 (360).

Both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 feature video chat when equipped with their respective camera peripherals, which are sold separately from the systems.

Nintendo's Wii, meanwhile, includes no such chat function and employs a friend code system which makes getting in touch with children—and virtually everyone else—much more difficult than on Microsoft and Sony's consoles.

Purdue University cyber forensics lab director Marc Rogers said that parents may not be aware of the online functions of home consoles, or the means by which parental locks can be bypassed.

Microsoft offers training to police and other agencies on how to extract text messages and other information from Xbox 360 consoles seized in arrests and investigations.