Parents Safety FAQ's

All I hear is about the junk, violence, & pornography online. Why should I bother getting Internet access for my kids?

You have to bother. The Internet is the largest library of information available to mankind. More than a billion pages exist at all levels online. Most mid- level jobs require computer & Internet skills, & almost all of them will require these skills by the time our children look for employment. Our children need this skill for their future careers.

The Internet is a big help with homework & school assignments. It’s also a terrific way for your children to get to know people from other countries & cultures. It’s the cheapest ticket for worldwide travel you can get. It’s also a wonderful place for your children to share their creativity with others. They can write, they can report on things, they can draw & share their artwork & music with millions of people around the world. It’s the world’s biggest soapbox.

It’s no longer an option. The Internet is now essential to our children’s future.

I know my kids will do nothing but surf the sex sites because they’re so easy to find online. Are my worries justified?

Kids tell me that after the first few exposures, most adult content becomes boring. Interestingly enough, when kids surf "inappropriate" sites, they are generally surfing gory sites, not sex sites. In addition, although there’s still too much hard-core sexual content available to everyone, more & more of these sites are requiring proof that the viewer is over eighteen.

Education & building a solid & trusting relationship with your children is the first line of defense against these dangers. So is finding fun & entertaining appropriate sites for kids, so they have alternatives to surfing "inappropriate" sites.

I trust my kids not to "go there," but I’m afraid that everywhere they go there will be pornography. They won’t be able to avoid it, even when they follow my rules. Is that true?

There are many ways to keep your children on the straight & narrow when it comes to choosing web sites to surf. To prevent the problems they can use kidfriendly search engines & preapproved site lists, as well as other special kid-friendly resources.

I hear that the Internet is loaded with criminals. Is that true?

The Internet is a community, & like all communities it has its good & bad actors, its safe & dangerous places. Predators exist everywhere, online & off. The proportion of bad actors in cyberspace is no different from that in the real world. As long as we have criminals in this world, though, we will have ingenious people who abuse the system through the use of new technology & media. They are often the first to learn how to manipulate the new medium. The trick is knowing how to avoid trouble & taking whatever steps are necessary to protect yourself & your family & prevent problems.

I think that the only way to keep your children safe is to keep them off-line. Is that true?

The only thing you are guaranteeing if you keep your children off-line is that they will fall behind in knowing how to use & enjoy the most powerful educational & communication medium in the history of the world.

There are many things you can do to protect your children in cyberspace. It’s just like protecting them anywhere else. You don’t let six year- olds wander into a big city all by themselves. You know what dangers exist "out there" & you teach your children how to avoid those dangers. You set rules & enforce them.

Protecting your children in cyberspace isn’t any different. The only problem is that you don’t know what the dangers are. Once you do, you can set the rules & enforce them, just as you do in the real world. It’s really that simple.

My children are receiving pornographic e-mail. Does that mean they have been visiting adult sites?

Not necessarily. The e-mail they are receiving is the online equivalent of junk mail, called "SPAM." The SPAMmers grab any e-mail address they can find online from chatrooms (even child-friendly ones), profiles, web sites, instant messages, & e-mail directories. It’s called "harvesting." While your children may indeed be accessing adult sites, usually they’re receiving adult SPAM purely by accident.

Okay, you convinced me. But I’m not a techie, & I can’t even program my VCR. How can I supervise my children online?

It’s easier than you think. I have to confess that even I can’t program my VCR, yet I’m considered one of the world experts in online safety. (Go figure!) It’s largely common sense once you know how things work. It’s not technology, it’s mainly communication & education.

I hear there are no laws in cyberspace. Is that true?

No. Generally everything that is illegal off-line is illegal online. And while we don’t have cyberpolice just for the Internet, we have units of major law-enforcement agencies who do police cyberspace, & any law enforcement agency who has jurisdiction over the online crime can handle it. The problem isn’t the laws, it’s getting enough trained law- enforcement officials & enough technology & funding to enforce them.

I’m afraid that my children will be kidnapped or molested by someone they meet online. How serious a risk is that?

The operative term here is "online." No one can molest your child online, or kidnap your child online. They can only do that off-line. So it’s much easier to avoid than people think. Just teach your child never to meet anyone they know online, off-line. Most of the cases where this happens, children willingly meet strangers off-line. & that’s a parenting issue, not an Internet one.

And although even one child is too many, this happens very infrequently —fewer than a thousand child molesters who lured or attempted to lure a child online have been arrested (almost 98 percent of whom were found guilty). (There are 19 million children in the United States alone who are online.)

Isn’t pornography illegal? And, if so, why isn’t anyone doing anything about it online?

There isn’t a legal definition of "pornography." It’s what regular people call "sexually explicit materials," & lawyers call "obscenity." Obscenity is material that is hard-core & has no redeemable (like artistic or scientific) value.

But even when the material online is clearly illegal in the United States, it might be legal where produced & where it resides online. Also, even when something illegal is produced in the United States, there are other risks (such as online predators) that get priority (and should) by law enforcement, who don’t have enough resources to handle all legal problems online yet.

Don’t porn sites have to require proof that their viewers are eighteen or over?

Legislation was passed making it illegal for any commercial site to show sexually explicit images without proof of age, but it was held unconstitutional. At the time of this writing there is no law that requires US adult-site operators to restrict access to people eighteen or over, or require proof of age. That’s one reason why it’s up to us as parents to look out for our kids online.

I don’t have lots of money. How am I supposed to afford filtering software?

Most of the filtering tools cost under $30, & many are free. I’ll tell you more about these tools—what they do, where to get them, & how much they cost—in our review section & at getnetwise.org