Child Safety and Online Dangers
By Marion Jones On July 6th, 2009What is there to say about the world children live in these days? Sexed-up television, pornographic Internet sites and videos and violent board games. A world that is dropping its standards, values, and morals each day, surrounds our children.
What makes it even worse is that we cannot use Parental Controls any more to prevent our kids from visiting websites of an adult nature. These days children are knowledgeable about technology and sometimes more so than their parents. How can we keep our children safe from online dangers? How can we as parents provide safety for our children, while still fighting the corruption that goes on in the world?
Parental Controls are available on most types of Internet software, yet today, children are skilled at by-passing these Parental Controls. So, what can we do? We can protect our kids by monitoring their activities on the Internet closely.
How to use parental controls: It depends on which Internet provider you have, however, I will speak only of the Internet providers I know about, since all programs are different. To use AOL Parental Controls, you will need to go to Safety at the Toolbar and click on Parental Controls.
Once you arrive there, you will see a list of usernames available. Search for your child’s username and click on the username. You will see a popup window appear. Click on ‘Edit Web Control’ and then click ‘Kids Only’, and close. Now your child is guarded against dangerous sites.
Chat rooms pose serious threats to children, since anyone can go into these rooms, and often predators frequent these areas, so as to entice children into a web of danger. In the AOL program, click ‘Safety’ and then click ‘Parental Controls’.
In the same way, click on the ‘Edit IM Controls’, ‘Edit E-mail Controls’, and ‘Edit Chat Control’ and complete the same steps as you did to establish the ‘Parental Controls’.
It is wise to setup passwords. Passwords will offer additional protection and safety to your child. Do not give the child the passwords, since this will give the child control of your Internet connections, and the child might reset the controls.
It is also wise to activate your ‘Popup Controllers’ too, since if you do not turn on the controls, pop ups could carry a virus that could corrupt your computer or popup adult content, which your child will see when online. You can go into ‘AOL Safety’ at the toolbar to start these popup blockers.
If you use Internet Explorer; open a page. Click on ‘Tools’ at the top menu, then click ‘Popup Blocker’ and then click ‘Popup Blocker Settings’. Read the details carefully and set the program at medium. Medium is the norm and will block most pop ups. If you put the settings higher than medium, you could find it difficult to open websites for browsing.
Some of the dangers presented to children online include: Internet Porn; Child Porn; Child Sexual Abuse; Mobile Porn; and more. So, your child is in danger, and if you want to conquer safety, you will have to monitor, and take steps to safeguard your child against online dangers.
According to recent studies, students have met sexual malpractices through webcams, instant messengers, and mobile phones. Additional studies show that pornographic websites are making more profit than each of CBS, ABC, and NBC television channels in a year. The surveys claim that the largest group that views porn sites are children. These children are between the ages of twelve and seventeen.
The statistics showed that around 74% of the porn sites had unmonitored banners, while another 66% of the sites did not issue adult content warnings. Another 11% of the sites did not have sexually explicit content warnings, and 25% mousetrapped the visitors, by not allowing them to leave the sites. Only 3% of the websites out of more than 14 millions adult sites requested adult permission for minors. Protect your child now!


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