Online Dangers to Child Safety

by Marion Jones

What 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 children from accessing 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 Internet dangers? How can we as parents provide safety for our children, while still battling the corruption going on around 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 guard our children by monitoring their activities on the Internet closely.

How to use parental controls: It depends on which Internet provider you have, however, I will write only of the Internet providers I am aware of, since not all programs are the same. To use AOL Parental Controls, you will need to go to Safety at the Toolbar and click on Parental Controls.

Once you get there, you will see a list of usernames available. Look for your child’s username and click on it. You will see a popup window appear. Click on ‘Edit Web Control’ and then click ‘Kids Only’, and close. Now your child is protected against dangerous sites.

Chat rooms can be 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 browser, 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 follow the same steps as you did to instigate the ‘Parental Controls’.

It is wise to set up passwords. Passwords will offer additional protection and safety to your child. Do not give your child the passwords, because this will give the child control over the Internet connection, and the child might even reset the controls.

It is also a good idea to use 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 if 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 information carefully and set the program at medium. Medium is standard 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 encountered sexual malpractices through webcams, instant messengers, and mobile phones. Additional studies show that pornographic websites out-rate CBS, ABC, and NBC, thereby making more profit than each of these television channels in a year. The studies claim that the largest group that views porn sites are children. These children are between the ages of twelve and seventeen.

The results revealed that around 74% of all the porn sites had uncontrolled banners, while another 66% of the websites did not announce 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 millions adult sites requested adult permission for minors. So, it is vital to protect your child now!

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