Child Safety Online

by Marion Jones

What can we say about the world children live in these days? Sexed-up television, pornographic Internet sites and videos and violent board games. A world lowering its standards, values, and morals each day, surrounds our children. Child safety online has become a serious issue.

What is even worse is that we cannot use 'Parental Controls' any more to keep our children away from websites of an adult nature. Children nowadays are advanced in technology, and sometimes more so than their parents.

How can we protect our children against online dangers? How can we as parents provide safety for our children, while battling the corruption going on worldwide?

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 about child safety online? We can guard our children by monitoring their time spent on the Internet closely. (article continues below)

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How to use parental controls: It depends on which Internet provider or browser you use, however, I will speak only of the Internet providers I know about, since not all programs are the same.

To use AOL Parental Controls and activate child safety online, you will need to go to 'Safety' on the toolbar and click on 'Parental Controls'.

Once you arrive there, you will see a drop-down list of available usernames. Search for your child's username and click on it. You will see a popup window appear. Click on 'Edit Web Control' and then click 'Children Only', and close. Now your child's safety online is protected against websites that hold potential dangers.

Chat rooms pose serious dangers to child safety online, since anyone can go into these rooms. Often predators frequent these areas, so as to draw children into a web of danger. In the AOL program, click on 'Safety' and then click on 'Parental Controls'.

Next, following the same steps click on the 'Edit IM Controls', 'Edit E-mail Controls', and 'Edit Chat Control' and follow the same steps as you did to setup the 'Parental Controls'.

It is a good idea to install passwords. Having passwords will increase child safety online. However, do not give the child the passwords, because this will give the child control over the Internet connection, and the child might also reset the controls.

It is also wise to use your 'Popup Controllers' too, since if you do not turn on the online child safety controls, pop ups could carry a virus that could corrupt your computer or popup adult content, which your child will see if online. You can go into 'AOL Safety' at the toolbar to set 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 posed to child safety online include: Internet Porn; Child Porn; Child Sexual Abuse; Mobile Porn; and more. As you can see, your child is at serious risk, and if you want to master child safety online, you have to monitor, and take the steps to safeguard your child against online dangers.

According to recent studies, students have encountered sexual malpractices through webcams, instant messengers, and mobile phones. Further studies reveal that pornographic websites are making more profit than each of CBS, ABC, and NBC television channels every year. The surveys claim that the largest age group that views porn sites are children and that these children are typically between the ages of twelve and seventeen.

The results revealed that around 74% of all the porn sites had unmonitored banners, while another 66% of the websites did not issue adult content warnings. Furthermore, another 11% of the sites did not have 'sexually explicit content' warnings and 25% boxed in their visitors by not allowing them to leave their websites. Only 3% of the websites out of more than 14 million adult sites requested adult permission for minors. So, it is vital to ensure your child safety online!