Some potential dangers for children

Exposure to inappropriate material

There is a risk that children may be exposed to material that is pornographic, sexually explicit or offensive, hateful or violent in nature, or that encourages activities that are dangerous or illegal.

Some sites promote extreme political, violent, racist or sexist views. Such materials can be accessed via the World Wide Web or newsgroups, shared in peer-to-peer (P2P) networks, or sent via email or instant messaging services.

Access to such material may occur inadvertently through searching for educational content about people, places or issues. Children should be aware of safe searching techniques and use a family-friendly search engine for searches. Parents should be aware of who to report problems to and how to deal with unsolicited inappropriate material.

Physical danger

‘Stranger danger’ is also a risk associated with the internet. It is possible your child may physically meet a person who may claim online to be someone they are not. It is vital that children know not to provide personal information to anyone they meet online. In some cases paedophiles have used chat rooms, email and instant messages to gain a child’s confidence, and then arrange a face-to-face meeting.

Unwanted advertising and marketing towards children

Commercialisation of the internet is on the increase. This high level of commercialism is evident in World Wide Web, in email, in online marketing – even taking the form of online gambling.

Scam websites have been set up to deprive people of money or opportunity. Some websites may be bogus or dummy sites—for example, websites supposedly belonging to banks which have been developed to deceive people into providing credit card details (known as ‘phishing’). Because of the persuasive nature of these bogus sites, children may put themselves or their family at financial risk by providing their own or their parents’ credit card details. The basic rule of thumb is that if something seems too good to be true, it probably is!

Financial risks

Another financial risk related to internet use is called ‘dumping’. Internet dumping occurs when somebody is tricked into disconnecting from the internet at the normal cheaper rate and unknowingly reconnecting at a more expensive rate. It often occurs when you click on a web page element, such as a picture or link, which contains a malicious computer code. The expensive rates are usually an international or premium number, such as the 190, 191, 192 prefix numbers. These numbers are often timed, so the longer you stay connected, the more expensive the account will be. If a large sum of money appears mysteriously on your telephone bill, you may have been a victim of an internet dumping scam.

Harassment and bullying

Cyber bullying can be carried out through internet services such as email, chat rooms, discussion groups, instant messaging or web pages. It can also include bullying through mobile phone technologies such as SMS. Cyber bullying can include teasing and being made fun of, spreading rumours online, sending unwanted messages and defamation.

Exploitation

Some websites prompt people to complete a form revealing their name, email address, age and gender, and sometimes even their telephone number and postal address, in order to access information. Some requests are legitimate – much depends on the nature of the website requesting the information. Providing personal information online can result in a person being targeted for spam (unsolicited email), advertising materials and/or viruses. Privacy issues also apply to developing personal websites and publishing online. Providing personal details, including photographs, may lead to the information being captured and reused by others for illicit purposes.

Personal information and privacy

Just as you would not provide personal information to someone you meet on the street, neither should you do so on the internet. Issues to do with identity protection revolve mainly around web authoring and website requests for such information. Creating web pages can be a fun and educational experience for children. However, there is a danger that children will post home addresses and other personal details on websites, including photographs of themselves or other children. This carries the risk of such material being used inappropriately. Likewise, placing a child’s email address on a website could lead to them receiving sexually explicit or offensive emails.

Unreliable information

Information on some websites may misrepresent the truth, be misleading, be out of date, biased or just incorrect. Some racist websites claim to tell or represent the truth about complex social, cultural or historical issues in ways that appear logical and plausible. Such websites are known to actively merchandise or even recruit people.

Spam

Spam is the email equivalent of junk mail or nuisance telephone calls. Spam is simply any unsolicited electronic mail sent in bulk to individuals or organisations. It can include viruses or pornographic content. Spam is becoming increasingly prevalent and is an issue for anyone with a personal email address. Filters can be used to prevent spam from entering a mailbox, but spammers are using increasingly sophisticated techniques to bypass filters. Children need to recognise and delete spam without opening it.

Viruses

While email is a useful way of communicating and sharing information, risks include unsolicited email from unknown senders that may contain virus-infected attachments or links that lead to a virus-infected website.

Communication

Internet technologies such as email, chat rooms and electronic conferencing are fast, easy and effective means of communicating and sharing information. internet-enabled devices including mobile and camera phones and personal digital assistant (PDAs) can also be used for text messaging and exchanging photographs or video. There are, however, some risks associated with using these technologies:

There are, however, some risks associated with using these technologies:

• Emails can contain virus-infected attachments or be used to bully and harass, including of sexual harassment or racial vilification.
• Text messages can be used for the same purpose.
• In chat rooms the same risks apply, and in unmoderated chat room environments people may adopt false identities. This is known as ‘online grooming’.
• In extreme cases, students can be exposed to physical danger in the event of a face-to-face meeting with someone they may have met in a chat room.

The internet offers an enormous range of opportunities for your family. Instant communication, information discovery and online publishing open up a world of exploration and fun for children of all ages. However, as in the real world, there are potential problems and risks associated with internet use. By adopting an internet safety strategy, your children can be protected online. There are four basic ways you can achieve this:

• education;
• encouragement and support;
• make the computer safe; and
• supervision.

Using all four ways together will give you the best results. The aim is not only to protect children, but to help them learn to make the right decisions when faced with a dangerous situation online.

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