Cross posted from my social media blog-its a relevant discussion for this audience too.
As the parent of one tween (10.5 who will be 11 in two months) and an 8.5 who wants to do what her big sister does – social networks like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc., are sources of big concern for me -and I know a lot about them. Â Which seems to put me well ahead of my peers who are parents confronting these issues.
To fully understand the issue I (and other parents of tweens today) face, you need to understand the landscape.  Chances are if  you are reading this blog, you do, but for the sake of clarity:
At school, softball, camp-pretty much any place more than three kids gather, eventually the conversation turns to Facebook, texting, YouTube and any one of a myriad of social games. Â Now, like many parents I am guilty of enabling this conversation by outfitting my kids with the iPod Touch, which opens up the magic of the app store to them. Â I am aware of at least three apps that my girls and their friends use regularly that are not compliant with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). Â And these are the ones I worry most about.
Through the age of 13 (which is why its the magic number for Facebook, YouTube, Twitter etc) COPPA provides some rigorous rules about how kids under 13 are treated on websites. Â Speaking as someone who has had to consider COPPA compliance – it’s not treated lightly in large companies. Â I can see in some start-up environments though there being more of a “let’s wait to see if someone complains” attitude.
Basically, COPPA provides strong content guidelines and enforcement as well as protections against the collection of PID (personal identification). Enforcement of COPPA falls on the Federal Trade Commission.
So back to my parenting conundrum. Â Both of my kids (more so 10.5) have friends who are on Facebook, regularly post videos to YouTube and are on social gaming sites like Second Life etc. Â My kids, not so much. Â They have email, I let them on Opionaided (it is COPPA compliant) and they can play social games targeted at tweens that are COPPA compliant.
But the battle continues. Then comes the part that confuses me, although I know it should not. Â Since becoming a single parent, I am more apt (perhaps more open) to talking with other parents at school events, temple, parties etc. – and they seem unaware of the kind of information their children are sharing on social networks.
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My two oldest boys (17/15) have been on FaceBook for a few years now but under the strict rule that I’m their friend and monitor their postings.
My dilemma is when I see young girls that are their friends posting something on my kids wall and I go to their profile and they have it wide open to the world, postings, pictures, videos, etc. I don’t want to sound like a stalker but either the girls or their parents need to know how to close down access to their information to only verified friends. I have my kids try to tell them but I rarely see any changes. If I happen to know the parents, I casually mention that I noticed this after following a link on my son’s pages…and the parents are usually shocked.
It is a different world these days..isn’t it?
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At least you are using the parental controls. I’ve thought about teaching classes on these things where I live. The level of folks who know nothing about basic net safety is alarming. My niece and her swim team were giving away all kinds of information through photo tags-and their parents never understood until I laid it out for them.
The reality is, you can only control your little corner of the internet, and you have to do your best. It sounds like you are, so just keep it up, and eventually it will sink in. The other thing I do is share (especially with my older one 11) stories of poor internet safety and what can happen. It seems to work, and she actually helps her sister with it.
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You guys are right on and I have a 16, 13 and 12 yr old and am also an Internet expert (having been an Internet CEO at various companies in the last 12 years). I can tell you that the potential dangers of social networks are far greater than what you can see as a friend of your kid. Here are two great examples.
1. some of the most damaging stuff (comments and photos) are posted by your kid’s friends on their pages, not your kids pages. You can’t always get to them. And if your kid has 300 friends, how many hours a week would it take you to look at all the pages of all those 300 kids to see if they posted any objectionable comments or photos of your kid? Answer; impossible to monitor since you don’t have the time and probably not the access.
2. how can you tell if a 40 yr old man is trying to friend your 14 yr old daughter? Answer; you can’t. They can lie about their age and use a fake photo. But here’s one way to get an idea. If your daughter has 300 friends, and receives an invite from a person who is NOT friends with any of those 300 kids, then that’s a suspicious sign. But, you have no way of being able to tell. We do.
Check out http://www.socialshield.com. This is what we do. Offer a protective layer that keeps an eye out for suspicious or dangerous activity, yet it’s not spying and doesn’t require that you friend your kid (which can be embarassing for them). If we see something suspicious, we flag it for you. The product is early, but will quickly increase it’s depth and range of coverage and effectiveness. Am interested in what some of you other dads think. At every dinner and school event I go to, this is indeed always a topic of conversation and I’m getting flooded with volunteers for beta testing.
George
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Hey George thanks for reading and thanks for the tip on Social Shield. I will check it out. Appreciate it.
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I completely agree with Andrew. If you are going to be willing to let your child(ren) have accessibility to any and all social media, then you will essentially have to check/run two accounts of what you and they are involved in. Therefore, if you have a Twitter and so do they, well then you are running yours while keeping an eye on theirs. If you do not, then you are running the risk of opening your child(ren) up to the world where not everything is as it seems and the naive can so easily be taken advantage of. Definitely more work but well worth it in my opinion.
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It is very important to figure out if a social networking site have security features and complies with COPPA. The internet can be very beneficial for kids but the potential dangers make it not worth it to use. One site that may be worthwhile to look into is Kids Social Network (http://www.kidssocialnetwork.com). This site complies with COPPA and has its own big brother feature.
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Hi, I really appreciate your blog. Great,
Happy Friendship day sms