POLICE are investigating after a father walked in on a man making sexual comments to his six-year-old boy over the internet

The boy was playing on-line game Minecraft in the bedroom of his Middlesbrough home when he was allegedly sent a series of explicit messages.

The father, a carer for his son who has Asperger syndrome, said: "I’ve had people saying things to me about how he shouldn’t have been on Xbox Live by himself, and I hold my hands up that I made mistakes.

"I didn’t even think you could use that for chat. I’ve now been taught how to make it safe and I’ll be doing that before he gets the Xbox back. I’m not ready for him to go back on it yet though."

He added: "I live on my own with my son so I can’t be with him 24 hours a day. I was downstairs tidying up and he was in his room for literally half-an-hour. He got all these messages in that half-an-hour.

"The first message was sent at 6.22pm and the last at 6.52pm. I check on him all the time. I went upstairs and heard a man’s voice.

"I knew something was wrong because my son came out of his room when he heard me coming up and told me not to go in, not to go on the game.

"The comments were made by this person thinking he was talking to a little girl and they get more and more vile as they go on."

Cleveland Police confirmed it was investigating.

Microsoft, which makes the Xbox and owns Minecraft, said protect Xbox Live members was a priority.

A spokesman added: "We continually evaluate ways to manage safety for our more than 48 million Xbox Live members, particularly children on our service."

For help setting parental controls visit http://support.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-360/security/xbox-live-parental-control