Parental Monitoring Software

I just read an interesting article by CBS News that was posted back in 2006. Here’s some interesting quotes from the article:

“The Center for Missing and Exploited Children reported more than 2,600 incidents last year of adults using the Internet to entice children. With numbers like that, you’d think all parents would be hovering over their kids, wanting to know what they’re doing online. But authorities say many parents are clueless about their kids’ MySpace profiles. ”

“In talking to some teens who regularly use MySpace, it’s easy to see that a lot of kids aren’t very careful about the information they put on their pages.

“So many people don’t even use common sense,” says Katie Pirtle, a high school student. “Some people even put their phone number on there.”

And while they information kids put on MySpace may be intended for their friends, do they think, “Hey there’s 35-year-old or 45-year-old guys out there looking at my site?”

“Definitely not,” says April Ehrlich, another high school student. “When they think MySpace, they think other teenagers. They don’t think there are adults pretending to be teenagers on there.”

Many MySpace users post “the survey,” which asks for responses about issues like drinking, drug use and skinny dipping. Users can also put up pictures. ”

Source: CBS News

I love when I see the news focusing on serious situations like this, instead of showing Britney Spears’ bald head.

Be sure to talk to your kids about the proper use of websites like MySpace, Facebook, and others. They should only use their first name with no other personal information about their location, last name, email address, etc.

There are predators on the internet and they do visit websites flooded with teens and kids. Make sure your kids know right from wrong before they step foot on the internet!