Internet Safety and Security

Tips for Parents on Internet safety

Most of us are familiar the image of Charlton Hesston coming down the mountain with gleaming white hair and holding two tablets that were written from the hand of God. This was a scene from the movie The Ten Commandments. Now I am not claiming the following tips are inspired from God. The following tips are just a few thoughts from a parent of three teenagers.

The Internet is a tool that must be used safely I hope these tips are a help.

1. I will not give out any personal information over the internet without my parents’ permission.

2. I will tell my parents right away if I come across any information that makes me feel uncomfortable.

3. When using the internet I will not use my picture or pictures of my family members.

4. The computer will be in the family room (not in a child’s room).

5. I will never agree to meet anyone that I met online without checking with my parents first.

6. I will not respond to any messages that are mean or in any way make me feel uncomfortable.

7. I will not give out my internet password to anyone, not even my best friends, other than my parents.

8. I will check with my parents before downloading or installing software or doing anything that could possibly hurt our computer or jeopardize my family’s privacy.

9. I will be a good online and not to do anything that hurts other people or is against the law.

10. I will help my parents to understand what I like online, how to have fun, and teach them about how to use the internet, the computers, and all technology.

Family, Protecting Children

I ran across this quote on an Internet safety site and I found myself saying ” what are you stupid or what” Here it is and I will explain.

Parents need to understand that the greatest risk our children face online is being denied access. The Internet is essential to our children’s education, future careers and lives. But even the most experienced Internet user doesn’t understand how children use the Internet and how to help them have a safer and more enjoyable surfing experience.

I’m sorry I don’t get it the greatest danger they face online is being grated to much access. The same thinking would lead you to say, don’t stop your kids from drinking or smoking for this will cause grave danger to them. Bringing up children in the day and age we live in is a BATTLE.

There are those that would like nothing more than to destroy your unsuspecting innocent children. The Internet is a place of good and evil it is a place that must be monitored and yes if need be cut off from your children. Please don’t fall into the trap of these so called educators who would say “Don’t keep a tight lease on your kids, trust them and allow them to explore for if you don’t you will push them away.”

HOGWASH Make sure you parent them this means lead, guide and yes saying NO when needed. Do the research and educate yourself in regards to protecting your family from the dangers of the Internet.

Parents need to understand that the greatest risk our children face online is being denied access.

Please do not fall for this it is your God giving responsibility to mold and protect your children.

Family, Protecting Children

BEIJING (Reuters) – China has banned electro-shock therapy as a treatment for Internet addiction, citing uncertainty in the safety and effectiveness of the practice after criticism in the local media.

The Ministry of Health announcement followed recent media reports about a controversial psychiatrist in Linyi, Shandong Province, who administered electric currents to nearly 3,000 teenagers in an attempt to rid them of their Internet habit.

There is a better way to control teens in their use of the Internet. Most would look at this article and throw their hands up and shake their head in unbelief of such stupidity. Teens need guidance, teens need leadership in the area of Internet usage, and they don’t need to be ZAPPED.

Teens speaking as a parent of three teenage girls’ teens need to be directed and corrected in the do’s and don’ts of the Internet. The problem is most parents want to be friends with their teens rather than parents.

Parents must sit down with their children and explain the dangers of the Internet. Parents must also establish rules to the usage of the Internet. The key to making this work is to consistency keep your word and follow through with the guidelines you set forth. What those guidelines are will vary with each family.

Parents also can and should use parental monitoring software, and a good Internet filter. This will be a huge help in keeping your teens safe online while also being able to monitor what they are looking at and where they are going.

Please don’t turn a blind eye to your teens use of the Internet You are not saying you don’t trust them by monitoring their Internet usage, you are saying I love you and I want to protect you.

Internet Safety, Parental Control, Protecting Children

Chat rooms

Children and teens are drawn to chat rooms. The problem is, sexual predators also are. Parents must wake up to the fact of how dangerous chat rooms can be. The fact that participants identities are unknown, the content unfiltered and the ability to unlimited access by virtually anyone, Make this a combination for disaster.

According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, 40 % of children ages 15 to 17 who are abducted are victims in connection with Internet activity. The way that kids use chat rooms open them up to all kinds of predators.

Polling of teens reveals that more than half who enter chat rooms – give out personal information to complete strangers., including their phone numbers, home addresses, where they go to school or their schedules.

The fact is the majority of kids who fall victim to chat rooms will not be abducted. To the contrary though the stranger lurking around the playground that you warn your child about , may be the person they are chatting with online.

Donna Rice Hughes, president of Enough Is Enough (EIE), a nonprofit organization that teaches families how to be safe online, says: “We recommend that parents seriously consider disallowing chat rooms because they are very difficult to monitor. And even in the monitored ones there are no guarantees because you can’t detect a disguised predator.”

Mrs. Hughes is right. We as parents must monitor and enforce rules on Internet usage. We must also install a secure Internet filter that will help us in protecting our family.

Basic tips for parents to discuss with their children.

• “Don’t talk to strangers” applies online, too.

• Explain that predators often disguise themselves as children online, and that they should never, have a personal discussions with anyone.

• Talk to you right away if they feel uncomfortable or threatened.

• Never give out personal information to anyone.

• monitor and limit the amount of time on the Internet.

The Internet is a wonderful place that can greatly benefit your children. The Internet is also a place of Danger, deceit and deception. As a parent keep your eyes open and be diligent in the effort of protecting your children.

Family, Internet Safety, Protecting Children

House Web Safety Bill Forthcoming

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., will soon introduce legislation that would create a competitive grant program for state and local education agencies and non-profit organizations to provide Internet safety education to teachers, schools and parents. The bill would authorize up to $175 million over a five year period, would be administered by the Justice Department in collaboration with the departments of Health and Human Services and Education.

There is no one thing that will that will eliminate misuse of the Internet. It must be a joint effort with parents leading in the way. Wasserman Schultz said at a Wednesday briefing on Capitol Hill sponsored by Point Smart, Click Safe – a coalition of non-profits and companies like Comcast, Google, Verizon, and Yahoo. “Our bill recognizes that knowledge must be our children’s first line of defense”

We as pareants must educate our children in the dangers of the Internet. There are a host of products that can aid in safe Internet usage, but it comes down to parents talking with there children and implementing a good Internet filtering system.

Filtering Internet, Internet Safety, Protecting Children

Wake up –Parents it is your responsibility to protect your children from Internet Predators.

Please do not turn a blind eye to your Child’s use of the Internet. We live in a world that sick people or shall I say animals are lurking in Chat rooms, Social websites and countless other places waiting to take advantage of you unsuspecting children.

Following is a very disturbing article that shows the sickness of these online praetors.

Please talk to your kids, Watch what they are doing online and who they are talking to.

Choose a Internet filter that will help you keep the garbage from being pumped in your house and in your Child’s mind.

Sentencing will take place this week in the first federal cyber bullying case in the US which was brought to trial after a teenage girl took her own life.

Lori Drew, 50, pretended to be a boy on the MySpace website to befriend Megan Meier, who hanged herself after the virtual friendship ended.

A California judge postponed sentencing until 2 July to review testimony from two witnesses.

Ms Drew’s landmark case concerning internet law made worldwide headlines.

Megan, a neighbor of Ms Drew’s in St Louis, Missouri, and a former friend of her daughter, took her own life in October 2006.

The court was told that Megan killed herself after receiving several cruel messages from a fictitious 16-year-old boy named Josh Evans.

One post said the world would be better off without her.

Prosecutors said that Ms Drew and several others created the fake online page on MySpace, the social networking site, to find out what Megan was saying about her daughter after they had fallen out.

Read the article in its entirety here-http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8127533.stm

Family, Internet Safety, Protecting Children

Why, if you have children you have heard this word countless times. Mom why do i have to clean my room? Dad why do I have to take the trash out what about Johny let him do it.

When it comes to the Internet why you should have filtering software installed is summed up in the following.

Protect yourself and your family from unintentional Pornography.

Protect yourself and your family from intentional pornography.

Protect yourself and your family from onlinr preditors that lurk in chat rooms.

Protect yourself and your family  pop ups that are not appropriate.

Protect yourself and your family From Drugs  Advocating or promoting recreational use of any controlled substance.

Protect yourself and your family from Violence: Graphic images or written descriptions of wanton violence or grave injury (mutilation, maiming, dismemberment, etc.) Includes graphically violent games.

Protect yourself and your family from Suicide / Murder: Information on committing murder or suicide

Protect yourself and your family from Tasteless/Gross: Bodily functions. Tasteless humor. Graphic medical photos. Some extreme forms of body modification (cutting, branding, piercing).

Protect yourself and your family from Profanity: Crude, vulgar, or obscene language or gestures.

Internet Filter, Internet Safety, Protecting Children

The show features an interview with Marsali Hancock, the President of the Internet Keepsafe Coalition on the subject of minors and Internet safety. The Internet Keepsafe Coalition works in partnership with the US Department of Justice/Office of Juvenile Justice and Deliquency Prevention to create the Project Safe Childhood initiative. The initiative involves the Department of Justice and an array of agencies to protect the Internet experience of children.

via INTERNET PREDATORS–DOJ’S PROJECT SAFE CHILD INITIATIVE | DC Public Safety Audio.

Technorati Tags: Children, Internet, predators, prevention, PSA, Safety

Protecting Children Children, Internet, predators, prevention, PSA, Safety

Protect kids online with these tips

These ideas can help parents deal with cyber-bullying, predators and porn.

By Melissa Healy

January 26, 2009

Last week, the Supreme Court quietly let die a federal law dubbed the Child Online Protection Act, which made it a crime in the United States to post sexually explicit material on the Web for commercial gain without making provisions to block kids from gaining access.

A lower court in Philadelphia had struck down the law, arguing that parents could already shield their children from such material by installing Internet filters. Bush administration lawyers had appealed, countering that less than half of parents use such filters, leaving children in need of the laws protection. It was an argument the justices declined to take up, dismissing the case.

The legal wrangling underscored a long-standing truth about kids and the Internet: No matter how ill-equipped they may be, parents are their childrens last line of defense against smut, cruelty, adult predators and the poor judgment of youth online.

Installing Internet filters can be an effective block against pornographic images. But for many parents, they are daunting technology that can limit adults — and kids — legitimate searches as well, including those for information on sexual health.

They also are a poor defense against cyber-bullying and sexual solicitation on social networking sites.

Smart moves

Following are tips from the National Assn. of School Psychologists on protecting your kids online, even if your own online skills lag behind theirs.

Keep computers in easily viewable places, such as the family room or kitchen.

Talk regularly with your children about the online activities in which they are involved and Internet etiquette in general. Children should know the rule that many adults have learned from painful experience: Do not say online what you would not say in person.

Encourage children to be self-protective. Remind them that anything they say on the Internet or in phone text messages can be shared with others and misused. Ask them to consider if they want what they are saying and doing broadly disseminated. If not, they probably should not say or post it.

Be specific about the risks of cyber-bullying and their need to tell you if something that bothers them occurs.

Respect for adolescents privacy is important. But tell children that you may review their online communications if you have reason for concern.

Set clear expectations for responsible online behavior and phone use and consequences for violating those expectations.

Consider establishing a parent-child Internet use contract.

Consider installing parental-control filtering software or tracking programs but do not rely solely on these tools.

Be aware of warning signs that might indicate your son or daughter is being bullied, such as reluctance to use the computer, a change in the childs behavior and mood, or reluctance to go to school.

Document the bullying.

Be equally alert to the possibility that your child could be bullying others online, even if unintentionally.

Understand current local laws and your school policies. Work with your school to develop policies if they dont exist.

If you have concerns, contact your childs school to enlist the help of the school psychologist, school counselor, principal or resource officer.

File a complaint with the website, Internet service provider or cellphone company if you learn of problematic behavior.

Contact police if the cyber-bullying includes threats.

via Protect kids online with these tips – Los Angeles Times.

Technorati Tags: Children, computer, Filtering, health, help, Internet, Internet Filter, Internet Filters, network, Online, parents, predators, privacy, protection, service, web

Protecting Children Children, computer, Filtering, health, help, Internet, Internet Filter, Internet Filters, network, Online, parents, predators, privacy, protection, service, web

Parents, test your Internet Filter. An easy way kids get around the filtering of blocked websites is Google Cache.

I know allot of you parents take the time to implement the parental filters on the internet and with good reason. There is all manner of harmful material on the internet that could be disturbing to a young mind.

There is a simple way to get around internet filters that kids use more than you would imagine. That way is Google’s cache of the website that is being blocked. If the kids access the website through Google’s cache of the website then they will still get to view the objectionable content.

How do they do this?

It’s really quite simple. All you have to do is search on Google for the website using ththe cache tag in front of the website address. For example: cache:sexynude.com, thats all you need. with most monitoring software you can go through the logs and find out but by that time its too late to protect your child from the pornography as they already have seen it. The good news is that if they are old enough to understand the procedure to get around blocked internet websites they are old enough to talk to productively about it.

Test your internet filter, and get one that doesn’t allow this.

Technorati Tags: Internet, Internet Filter, news, Online, parents, Pornography, Safety, web, Websites

Protecting Children Internet, Internet Filter, news, Online, parents, Pornography, Safety, web, Websites