This week’s article looks at a report from the Internet Safety Technical Task Force that assessed technologies for protecting children from unwanted contact online. Their findings did not please everyone. Go to the link below and read the article. Write a reflective comment that shows you have read the article, expresses your views, and addresses my questions.
Do you know anyone who has been approached online by a predator? How reliable are age-verification technologies? The report said that "Parents, teachers, mentors, social services, law enforcement and minors themselves all have crucial roles to play in ensuring online safety for all minors." How should these groups be involved?
Task Force Report Article
21 comments:
NO I don't know anyone who had been approached online by a predator. Age verification is reliable because the approach favored by many law-enforcements officials who had pushed for the creation of the task force. These groups should be involved by working together.
I happened to have met one girl that knew someone that was approached by an online predator, though; she was told that it was her friend and that it was just a new e-mail. So the person that was fooling her was simply getting more and more information about her, and she did not realize because he had seen her and her friend’s conversations, therefore knew how to communicate with her without making her suspicious. Also, my sister’s e-mail got hacked by someone and it kept going online and talking to her younger friends, so that is also another example of lack of online safety. In my opinion, age-verification technologies are not very reliable because it is very simple to make up an age. Some ask for e-mails to verify the age you have given, but again, you can also lie while making your e-mail. I don’t fully understand what age-verifying technologies do, but from what I have read, I don’t believe they’re very useful thus, not very reliable. The groups mentioned should be involved by showing the younger kids for example how to set very safe privacy settings on Facebook. Parents should not let kids a certain age use MySpace and Facebook because the kids would still be too naïve at a certain age, therefore they would accept random users and they’d misunderstand anything perverted for something friendly. Law Enforcement can do something about the actual sites. For example, they can ask for a parent’s private number so that it is clear that the kid has gotten permission to access a specific website. That’s one thing law enforcement is capable of. In my opinion though, this would decrease the number of users. Hence, it would be bad for Facebook, MySpace, and other social networking sites as such. But all in all, I think that problems like these aren’t too scary because for a child to come in contact with a stranger, well it’s highly impossible. I think that parents should just watch out for what their kids are doing when they are going online, and make sure they’re talking to people they actually know, not people who want to know them. Also, make it clear that social networking sites are for getting in contact with old friends, or just keeping in contact with friends, not for meeting new people.
i also, don't know anyone who has been approached by an internet predator, but i did see a documentary about cops who would let themselves be lured to a place by a predator then arrest him (or her). i a bit confused about age verification technology because i don't learn to much about it in the article, but, if it does work well, then it ought to be used on almost all sites that can have contact from a private computer to another private computer. i do think that all people in the community should help each other be aware of the internet safety issues that are existent but not to be overly strict about them. by that i mean allowing SNS's but restricting contact to strangers. for example my facebook only has about 15 friends, some of which i don't know and i really don't want, and that's only from fifteen. i hope that i never get approached by an internet predator. but also agree that i can probably prevent it if i don't nose around trouble or anything suspicious, which is why awareness should be exercised, so that nobody does anything which could be inviting to a predator.
In our world today, the internet is a tool that most people are aware of and can’t live without. The internet has a wide variety of uses, but users have to be careful to not abuse the internet’s potential and hurt themselves in the process of doing so. Thus, we can’t always blame the internet for any problem that confronts us when we are using it. Additionally, we can’t be oblivious of the threats that the internet poses to its users. We have to become aware of these dangers and help our communities understand them so we can keep ourselves out of harm’s way. With this being said, parents, teachers, mentors, social services and Law Enforcement can play a more active role in ensuring that internet users are in no way being contacted by sexual predators while online.
One of my close friends was approached by an online predator this summer. This person started communicating with my friend on Facebook and got them thinking that they attended their school. At first, my friend had no idea what was happening, but soon, this predator started commenting on my friends’ pictures in a very inappropriate way. That’ when my friend realized what was happening and as a result, she canceled her Facebook and started a new one, making sure to only allow people that she knew very well to communicate with her. Furthermore, I was surprised to learn that a famous celebrity’s e-mail got hacked this summer. Due to this, risqué photos of her were surfacing on the internet for all users to view. At first, I didn’t believe that such a thing could happen, but then more stories like this started going public, which was a clear indication of how unsafe the internet is.
When it comes to age-verification technologies, it’s in my opinion that they are pretty much useless and unreliable. When minors want to view material online that has been prohibited for them, many will take matters into their own hands and lie about things such as their age and e-mail, simply to get their hands on such content. While at my friend’s house during the winter holiday, we visited YouTube and started watching the latest videos that people uploaded. Then, my friend clicked on a video that was not allowed to be viewed unless the viewer was 18 years or older. My friend who is only 15 years old entered false personal information about himself, including his e-mail, and was then allowed to view the video. Moreover, despite the little information that this article has provided us with concerning age-verification technologies, I have easily come to the conclusion that they’ll be of no help when it comes to online safety if people can lie about everything from their age to their e-mail, and then view web content that’s inappropriate for their age.
As for parents, teachers, mentors, social services, law enforcement and minors themselves, they should all work together to ensure that the internet is a safe place for all minors where they are not open to the threat of being approached by an online predator. First of all, parents should closely watch their children while they are on online and teach them to not be carless with the decisions they make when they are on the internet. They should teach their children to avoid contact with any person that they do not know or are not that familiar with while they are online. Additionally, parents should monitor the websites that their children are visiting and make sure that they’re appropriate for their age. On the other hand, minors should also take some responsibility into their own hands because “with great freedom comes responsibility”. The internet is a very complex tool that may harm its users if it’s not used in the right way. When minors are on sites, such as Facebook, they should make sure that they’re only communicating with people they know and not simply allowing people to become their “friends” for the sole purpose of having more “friends”. When it comes to teachers, mentors, social services and law enforcement, they can help raise awareness about online sexual predators by sharing stories with minors about people that have undergone such things and the negative consequences they’ve had to suffer, as a result of it. This will cause minors to be more responsible while online and it will allow them to think twice when they are forced to make decisions when they are on the internet that may affect them personally in the future. Most importantly, the internet shouldn’t be used by everybody, such as elementary kids. These young kids only view the internet as a learning place or a fun tool where they can get entertained. They aren’t fully aware of the risks that the internet poses to them and won’t understand how to protect themselves from these threats.
Above all, I believe that people should stop referring to the internet as place where they can meet new and interesting people. In most cases, this causes people to get fooled into thinking that they’re talking to honest people, when only the opposite is the truth. I am aware of a woman that thought she had found love online, when in truth, she was talking to a mentally-unstable woman. This caused the fooled woman to end her marriage in pursuit of her online love. In the end, this woman committed suicide after finding out the truth about her internet lover.
I don't know anyone who's been approached by online predators. I think that the 'age-verification technologies' are pretty useless. It's far too easy to lie about your age when all that's needed is a simple mouse click. There's sites that I'm a member of that require you to be 18 years or older. They're not bad or distasteful; they just need you to be 18. Facebook.com requires you to be 18, and just about everyone in the ACS high school has one (which 4 out of 5 students are not).
These groups are all important to the concept of online safety, and trying to keep it as safe as possible. Parents need to look at what their kids are doing. My parents set a lock on our computer and it locked out sites that the program deemed 'dangerous' (I won that debate and got it taken off because of it blocked facebook.com). Parents should, really, keep the passwords to all the sites that kids join. The only way that I could get a facebook was if my parents got the password- that's okay because there's nothing on there that I'd be horrified if they saw it. Teachers do what they can by keeping in line with the districts locks. ACS has locks on some sites, 'forbidden' sites. Mentors and social services would be the same as the parents and teachers for most kids (if they have one of the two). Law enforcement should keep up with odd looking sites, and set a lock unless their 18 years old or older. Minors know where they should and shouldn't be on the web.
It's no longer a 'keep my child safe' deal. Every kid knows how to use the web in this generation. Kids are growing up faster, and should know when something doesn't seem right. It's common sense to not meet someone that you've come into contact with over the internet. The idea of identification requirements is probably the only way to ensure that kids are where they need to be, and the adults are staying on the other side of currently flimsy wall, that should be a brick wall.
Nope i don't no anybody who has been approached by an online predator. age verification is reliable because it is reinforced by law- reinforcement officials. These groups should be involved by joining together and working together. they should also stay in contact.
Personally, I don't know anyone who has been approached by an online predator. But that definitely doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. It is a very real problem facing internet users these days. I have heard stories of people online being approached by electronic predators, though I have never known someone who this has happened to. This is just my opinion, but I don't think that age-verification technologies are extremely useful. It is just far too easy to lie about your age, and immediately get access to that site’s services. There is no way that the computer knows that you’re under 18, and a click of the mouse can immediately pass you off as something you’re not. As for the "parents, teachers, mentors....." part, I think that they can each help out in different ways. Parents should obviously see what their kids are looking at, and even block sites if necessary. Unfortunately, as is the case with the majority of the computers at ACS, blocking does not always solve the problem completely. As for teachers and mentors, they should definitely teach their kids lessons on why this stuff is wrong, and enforce the right ideas on them. As for social services and law enforcements, there is little that they can do to protect minors from doing this. They could probably just make age enforcement online even stricter, so fewer people would have access to sites that they are underage for. Again, this does not completely solve the problem. The most important role, and most responsibility, falls to the kids themselves. Call this whatever you wish, but I think kids should prevent themselves from going to these sites. What I mean by this is that they should listen to their conscience and do the right thing. Call that corny, but that’s what I think they should do. Above is what all people should do to ensure the safety of under-age kids online.
I actually don’t know any one who has been approached online by a predator. I believe that kids are very unsafe in our world when exposed to a full internet access. The verification technologies are completely useless, and do not help what so ever. I admit that I sometimes lie in those verification things (I do tend to be carful though). It is so easy to fool the system that a 5 year old can do it. I think that parents have a major role in protecting little kids from all the no-no's that the kids shouldn't do. It is sort of easy for the parents to put on a parental lock on their child's computer.
This is kind of off topic, but i think you should tell Rami to chill and not wright so much.
Oh my God i ment write* please don't count it as a spelling mistake.
Ammar! Quick! You still spelled 'meant' wrong...
owwwwwwwwwwww!
2eslakha toshe...
Wow, you actually wasted your time reading my post. Any ways I meant 'meant'.
No, I don’t know anybody who has been approached by a predator. I think that age verifications is not reliable, I don’t think it will help. For example, most of the people I know have facebook and you need to be 18 to have an account, plus its so easy to lie about your age when entering to any website, I don’t think that parent and other adults are wrong, but they personally think that its their fault that’s why the forbid facebook in school, which I totally disagree with because I don’t see the point in it, students are just going to go back home and open their email accounts, if its not allowed by their parents then they would go to their friends house, if not then they would go to an internet place, so I don’t see the point of forbidding the facebook. In my opinion it's really difficult do find a way to make age verification reliable.
No I haven’t met anyone who had been approached by a predator but I’ve heard of someone that has been approached to an online predator. I don’t think the age-verification technologies are reliable because it’s not really hard to change your age. Many sites have an age-verification even though its not needed. As for Parents, teachers, mentors, social services, law enforcement and minors themselves all should work together to make ensure the safe sites for all minors. Parents should know what their kids are doing on the Internet for example Facebook, Hotmail, Myspace, and Hi5. I think teachers, mentors social services and law enforcement should warn and aware the minors what is happening on the internet.
I don't know anyone that has been approached online by a predator, but I used to watch a show in America, in which they would catch those people. I think that Age-Verification technologies are just plain stupid...obviously most people will lie about their age, and I think that the Companies don't actually care about all of this, they just think of the money they are about to make, and they just add Age Restrictions because if they got sued or something and the guy that sued them was underage they could back up themselves by reminding him of the age restrictions. I think that the parents could just block those websites from the computer at home, and the teachers at school could just block these websites, and this would limit a minors time, which he will eventually get bored of trying to go on to it, and then he would just give up and stop trying.
PS: Don't compare me to the others.
The Internet is probably the biggest thing out there. It has so much information that sometimes are helpful to us and sometimes it has explicit content that are too graphic or just plain old inappropriat for a certain age group. I have never meet a person who has told me that they had problems with someone they met over the Internet. This does not mean there are not people who have there issues. There are alot of people who have this particular conflict and its all because they meet strange and sick people on the Internet. The age thing does not work all the time. Because once I was looking for a game that was rated mature because it had shooting and drugs and swearing. And the main part of the site it said that to view this site you have to be 18+ at that time all I wanted was to see the game demo so I clicked I agree and I was in. No birth date needed. So somehow I think that if they did sort of have a real blocker and birth date check and all that age security stuff the site its self, if it were trying to sell some thing or make money, they would obviously loose SOME profits. I do think that they should really watch the Internet, like the law enforcement should be involved because some times these sites pop up and auto link them selves to the site and thats all it takes for a curious boy to get caught.
The Internet is probably the biggest thing out there. It has so much information that sometimes can be helpful to us and sometimes it has explicit content that is too graphic or just plain old inappropriat for a certain age group. I have never meet a person who has told me that they had problems with someone they met over the Internet. This does not mean there are not people who have there issues. There are alot of people who have this particular conflict and its all because they meet strange and sick people on the Internet. The age thing does not work all the time. Because once I was looking for a game that was rated mature because it had shooting and drugs and swearing. And the main part of the site it said that to view this site you have to be 18+ at that time all I wanted was to see the game demo so I clicked "I agree" and I was in. No birth date needed. So somehow I think that if they did sort of have a real blocker and birth date check and all that age security stuff the site its self, if it were trying to sell some thing or make money, they would obviously loose SOME profits. I do think that the parents and teachers and law enforcement should really watch the Internet and should be involved because some times these sites pop up and auto link them selves to the site and thats all it takes for a curious boy to get caught in a mess.
My friend had once got approached online and he had been getting messages from this random person and telling my friend that he knows where my friend lives and he is going to hunt my friend down and feed him to the dogs. After he got so many messages he told his mom and then his mom called the police so the predator could get tracked down and sent to jail but I don't think the police found this person. It doesn't say much about the age-verification technologies but according to what was in the article it is reliable because of the companies who are making them. I think that they are reliable because it is a good way for the kids not to put down information that online predators will use to hack you. I think that the groups should be involved by making passwords on all the things that is bad for the kids and I also think that they should have all that they should block Facebook, Myspace, and all the things that would have information about you.
Yes, I actually do, one of my close friends has been approached by a predator.
Well in my opinion they’re pretty reliable because they’ve been reinforced by law- reinforcement officials. I don’t really see how teachers, and mentors could really help, but parents have the biggest role in this, and if they don’t trust their child they should probably put a “lock” on their child’s computer, otherwise I don’t really see how these groups could help apart from working together.
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