Online safety trainer and author of "I Can't Keep Up! a 'Clear as Crystal' guide to keeping your family safe online" says that banning kids from talking to strangers online could cause more problems than it solves
Every parent's worst nightmare is that their child will come into contact with someone that might do them harm.
Kids are taught from an early age that talking to strangers is bad, and even if they don't know exactly why, they know that if someone they don't know approaches them in the street, at the school gates, or in the park, offering sweeties, a lift home or the opportunity to go and visit some cute little puppies or kittens, they should run away and tell a trusted adult immediately.
This lesson is valuable and is still relevant today, although statistics suggest that the majority of offences against children are not perpetrated by strangers, rather by people that the child already knows.
Does "Stranger Danger" work online?
Banning kids from talking to strangers online just won't work.
The Internet is full of opportunities to connect with strangers, in chatrooms, on forums which encourage discussions of topics that interest our kids and on video game websites which encourage interaction between players.
If we as parents introduce a blanket ban on our kids talking to people they don't know 'in real life' then we run the risk of our kids disregarding this ban altogether, dismissing it with the rationale of 'Mum and Dad just don't get the point of the internet' which could lead to them getting into real trouble with online predators, trolls and Cyberbullies.
The key is to educate children about the differences between casual online interactions and 'over sharing' information.
As long as kids are careful not to share personal information about themselves, avoiding talking about their school, their home and where they like to 'hang out' with their friends, and take care not to reveal their real name or other information which could identify them to a predator, then these casual social interactions can help them to develop online skills which they'll need later in life.
It's OK for kids to congratulate an online gaming opponent on a particularly good win, to join in with debates on online forums about the latest movies and pop music albums as long as they do so safely. It can actually help them to learn to express themselves in writing, to formulate their own opinions and to have stimulating discussions.
I'm not saying that parents should just sit back and let their kids do whatever they want online without supervision
Online safety is about more than predators. It's about Cyberbullying, inappropriate website content, hate speech, extremism, inappropriate advice, viruses, malware and all sorts of other considerations. Parents need to establish a clear set of rules with their children about what is (and isn't) safe and acceptable behaviour on the Internet.
Using tools like parental control software can be enormously helpful in keeping track of what kids are up to on the Internet at home, but it's not the "be all and end all" of Internet safety.
Parents need to take responsibility for teaching their kids how to keep themselves safe when they're online in cybercafs, at friend's houses, at school and in the dozens of other places they can get online using portable devices.
They also need to accept that they don't have absolute control over who their children are spending time with in the "real world", the conversations they're having and the language they use in the company of their friends. All parents can do is to help their children develop their own set of values and hope that they live by them once they're out of sight.
Similarly, they can't exercise total control over their children's digital lives. If they try, then they risk losing ALL control because kids will always be one step ahead of their parents in the use (and abuse) of technology and will hide their tracks well if they feel they need to.
Comments
Post a Comment