Virginia was first with a law requiring public schools to teach classes on Internet safety. Hear, hear. Texas and Illinois have both followed suit. I totally agree. The Internet is something that has taken hold in the general public in the blink of an eye, relatively speaking. Its uptake has been rapid as compared to say, television or radio.
As an IT person who understands a fair amount of computers, technology and the Internet, I still maintain that computers are complicated beasts, and it is downright scary how little people know and understand. This doesn’t stop them from trawling the Internet, happily clicking away at things they don’t understand. And while I believe that kids will be entirely more comfortable than their parents at using computers and being on the Internet, I don’t think that they will as a group be knowledgeable enough.
As Virginia sees the importance of educating teens and parents about Internet safety, it is more important that parents take the need for this seriously: be informed, be involved. I urge parents to take advantage of the helpful resources out there about Internet safety. A little knowledge goes along way.
For more information on children’s Internet safety, check out some of these blog posts. I’d love to hear your comments:
1. Safety Tips for Parents: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/03/25/a-parents-guide-to-internet-safety-for-children/
2. Online Predators: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/04/03/protecting-kids-online-the-myths-and-realities-of-online-predators/
3. Cyberbullying: http://www.covenanteyes.com/blog/2008/04/07/cyberbullying-the-new-playground/
Along these lines . . . Have you heard of Covenant Eyes monitoring and filtering programs? It is a unique program on the market because it gives the user flexibility to filter or simply monitor the Internet or both. A good filtering program is very helpful for children and families, but a good monitoring program is great for adults and children alike who want to be accountable to others about where they go online.
Covenant Eyes monitoring program simply tracks (without blocking) everywhere someone goes online. Then each part of each webpage is rated and scored for its content (scores are based on obscene or pornographic material). Users choose 2 or 3 people that they want to receive a detailed “accountability report” of all their online activity (emails to them or available to see online 24/7). What this does is it allows complete freedom to the person using the Internet, but it takes away the anonymity of online activity; people are more likely to exorcise self-control when they know that others will be reviewing their whereabouts online.
The monitoring program also works great for places of business. Statistics show great numbers of hours of lost work time searching for unrelated material online, and most adults who pornography online do so during working hours.
I’ve found the program very helpful.
Covenant Eyes also has a promotional code you can use to get a free month to try out their accountability service. Go to http://www.covenanteyes.com and enter promocode ‘onefree’ to receive a free 30 day trial of the program.