What can we as parents do to educate our children about the dangers surrounding the internet. With all that ..

Question

has been going on in the world today with the internet I must say that I am very much frightened for my girls as far as the internet goes. It seem as if you can gain internet access just about anywhere in the world today and we as parents can't follow our kids 24 hrs/day. Has anyone ever experienced anything and what did you do to correct the problem and was it in your favor. I am a mother of two girls 14 and 7. Serious answers only please

Answer 1

hmmm the 14 year old will be difficult. The most you can do is try to limit/monitor their internet usage in your own home (there are MANY programs out there for this), and TALK TO THEM. Explain the dangers to them, explain that not everyone is what they seem to be online, tell them to NEVER give out personal information (even just a first name!) and never meet someone that they talk to online.

You could try going to a local police station and asking if they have any literature on protecting and talking to your children about the internet as many police stations (near me at least) DO have some info they can give you.

They may whine and *****, but if they hear it and some part of it sticks in their minds ... could save their lives.

good luck.

Answer 2

What are the dangers of the internet? The internet can't do anything to your daughters. It is a network protocol and interconnection scheme. It provides the transport of data from one computer to another.

Many applications have been developed that take advantage of the internet, from email to the world wide web, to instant messengers like AOL. A lot of this software allows people to communicate with each other, or in the case of the www, to publish information.

Which is more dangerous do you think? Someone using a payphone to call your daughter on the phone and invite her to meet them somewhere, or someone using a web cafe to send an email to invite her to meet them somewhere?

We can thank our increasingly entertainment oriented news media for sensationalizing a few edge cases where for example, myspace was one part of a tragedy, but myspace itself is really nothing more than the electronic version of a bulletin board where people can leave each other messages.

At the end of the day, the important thing is that you don't fall victim to media sensationalization. Your daughters stand to gain a great deal from an understanding and use of the internet. The important thing is that you educate yourself, and more importantly educate your daughters about the dangers that exist in the real world, in terms of strangers and the caution they need to exercise when dealing with them. Some simple rules to start with:

-Never give out any personal information like your real name and age, where you live, phone number, address etc. to anyone on the internet. Real friends can get those things in traditional ways.

-At the ages your daughters are at, I would not let them have a camera or microphone hooked up to their computer.

-I'd make sure that there accounts are limited, so that you are supervising them during the times they are on the computer. If for example you have XP, you can set them up with limited accounts and even limit the days and hours they use the computer. You can also get software that logs what they do, which you can review later. This includes websites they visit, chats they have with people, etc.

Last but not least, while it pains me to say it, I'd use a content filtering solution that blocks objectional websites. While they aren't perfect, they will provide a substantial deterrent to a lot of adult websites out there. With that said, this software isn't perfect, and the price of freedom of speech and ideas, is that there will probably be sites that will slip through the cracks. If there are particular sites you don't want your daughters visiting (myspace for example) this software (or proxy server) typically allows you to add to the list of sites they block by default.

Teens are of course curious and they will find things of they want them, no matter what you do. There are libraries and cafes and friend's houses after all. I think most parents would want to relate the facts of life to their kids directly rather than have them learn it in the schoolyard.

Answer 3

I met my husband on the internet, but I understand your need to protect your children. I have known many people online that have gone to meet people (even young girls) and sometimes it turned out to be a very bad experience. It shocked me how willing some young people's parents were to let them meet someone they had absolutely no information on whatsoever. I've found through years of chat, that the people that are usually more inclined to do this sort of thing are those kids between the ages of 13 and 19. I knew a girl who was 15, that went to meet a "boy" that was supposedly 16. When she met this young man, it turned out that he was 21 and had a child with another girl. I also knew a woman that carried on a relationship with a man for over 3 years, she even met him and slept with him. She got ready to move her life to Florida for this man. The day before she left his WIFE called her and told her that he had three children and was still married and sleeping in her bed!!! The wife had known about my friend for these three years but had no idea bout the wife. The wife assumed that they were just friends, and trusted her husband to talk to a woman she didn't know. You can get programs, that allow you as a parent to lock your children out of web-sites, that you don't think has appropriate content. These programs allow you to block porno websites (a given for most parents), social websites (like singles sites that wouldn't really be of any use to a 13 or 7 year old), and anything else you don't want your kids to participate in or see on the web.
Here's some websites you can look over to see if this is what you want to do.

http://www.softforyou.com/internet_monitoring.php

http://www.newfreedownloads.com/Internet/Miscellaneous/[e-mail]

http://www.freedownloadscenter.com/Network_and_Internet/Misc__Networking_Tools/Win_Spy_Monitoring_Software.html

Answer 4

Thanks for the properly spelled and punctuated question. I really appreciate that, especially since you don't see it that often around here. It really means alot to me. Now, about your kids, I'm sure they won't understand (I certainly didn't understand why I couldn't watch R-rated movies as a kid), and in those cases it's best to be loving but firm and implement some parental controls so they can't visit potentially dangerous sites. I know they will hate it and cause a huge commotion, but they will hopefully understand later in life. You can also install what is called a "keylogger" and it logs every keystroke. You can then browse or search the logs for words you might be worried about. You can find out where it was typed and remove that application or make rules against using it when you're not around. I hope I was helpful!

Answer 5

toddlers are taught "stranger probability" in colleges, yet regrettably, the overall public of paedophiles are commonplace to their victims. that is complicated to respond to this question. instructing adults about the indicators of paedophilia might want to be more effective than preparation toddlers, even though it would want to motivate mistrust among colleagues and bring about threat free human beings being wrongly accused. A CRB verify may no longer be indicative. A polygraph try might want to correctly be fooled. Hmm, a mind test? even as i became volunteering at an orphanage in l. a. Paz, Bolivia very last 3 hundred and sixty 5 days we were warned about newborn molesters. there became a small guy who lurked suspiciously around the front gates for some days. I instructed the policeman on shelter, and the guy became by no ability seen back. What got here about to him I neither understand nor care.

Answer 6

Thank you for your question. My son is 14 too. And I have the same problems.