There was much talk about educating children to use the internet responsibly and not give out personal details.
While this is a step in the right direction and something I support entirely, there is still a missing link, its alright having this information given to kids at school but there are very few schools that haven’t got censoring and monitoring on their internet connection so in theory they cant access potentially dangerous at school.
But at home? This missing link is the Parents, in most households the children would be seen as the most tech savvy so do the parents know about all the filtering and stuff they need to? I am also against filtering of the internet, in an interview with somebody from the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) on the news this morning said “the internet is just to big” To which my response was thank god somebody gets it, hopefully this will start filtering in to Kids and parents alike and we should all become more web aware because of it.
Links
http://www.thinkuknow.co.uk
Think U Know Campaign Video
http://www.ceop.gov.uk/
Thanks for your blog,it really hits home with me but parents need to wake up and take care of our children. We have been reviewing software for are computer for internet safety, to sell on are giveitakiss.com site. We have a good friend who is an investigator on the internet and he had shared some terrible stories about children being hurt through different sites out their. I am a mother of ten children and I will not allow someone to victimize my children. I thought by talking to my children and letting them know about the evils of the world and having this great open relationship would solve it all!! Also my children have a great relationship with God. OK I have all the bases covered, so I thought. Just when I wasn’t looking some slime took advantage of one of my daughters and now I refuse to be stupid again. I am sharing this with all of you in blogland so you can have the knowledge I have. We have been working with this investigator who goes to schools and all over the country teaching parents about the sites that all are kids are crazy about like myspace or instant messaging. It’s not the places themselves it’s just that you have no way of knowing everyone their. I have heard some parents say I don’t want to infringe on their privacy, wake up they need to be protected. I am mad and I want parents to be aware of the dangers and take guard against them. My husband and I give reviews at are web site giveitakiss.com of different software to set up on your computer, we sell one of them on EBay, that is the one that is really the cheapest and it works great. We catch everything!! Now we don’t go through and read all their mail, we watch who there talking to and who’s talking to them. This is the best $50.00 we spent and they don’t even know its there, you can even be at work and check out what their doing on line at home, WOW I found this amazing. Please understand I love children with all my heart and I am just sick and tired of people hurting them. My husband and I have a not-for-profit called Ark for Hope For Children and are whole purpose is to save abused children. So please take precautions and protect your children!!! God Bless, Verna Corbett
http://www.giveitakiss.com/blog/
Thanks for the comment.
However what happens when there is no censoring and filtering? The filtering of everything is not the long term solution, and in some cases can cause a lack of usefulness of the internet.
We as a world need to look at how we can improve awareness and just make simple things that make the web safer a habit not a chore.