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Do You Ever Read Your Child's emails?
As stated on the main page, Low Level Monitoring is a strategy for parents that are very confident they have a completely open relationship with their child MySpace user. They are sure that the teen will be open to letting the parent partake in their online experience. Keep in mind that most parents are gullible about this. Also keep in mind that most kids that begin to make bad decisions (drinking, sex, drugs, other crime) started off as good kids. That being said, a good kid that starts to stray would most likely create a new MySpace profile that their parents do not know about. Kids do stray, it's a reality.
Step One: Have the Introduction Talk
Let your child know you are interested in their online pages and would like to participate. Tell them that part of your interest is to help keep them safe from internet predators. For Low Level Monitoring, it is not necessary to go into anything concerning watching them for bad behavior because you should be confident such behavior does not exist.
16 yr. Old Girl Raped By Internet Predator
Tell them you would like their help setting up your own MySpace account (learn how to setup a MySpace account here) so you can become their "friend" and exchange online information. Even if you know how to setup the account or feel comfortable doing so with the instruction link above, you should let them help you. It gives them a sense of purpose and you can also get some queues as to how they may have setup their account (this is an import part of keeping your child safe and is the topic of Step Two.)
Here are some bullets to review with your child:
- MySpace is for exchanging information with friends you already have, not a place for meeting new friends. If they do meet someone through MySpace, they should treat them much differently, not sharing any personal information or anything that may divulge where they live, go to school, or work.
- Never post information that can be used to find you: real name, school, job location, address, telephone number, local sports teams, clubs you belong to, or favorite shopping places that may be unique to your area.
**important**: Teens may claim that some of the info is kept private or only viewable in the MySpace setup. Please remember that there are people out there that are quite savvy and can find their way into this info. For High Level Spying, I recommend the Parents Knowledge Kit for Online Child Safety which contains direction on how to get to your child's information if you were not fortunate enough to have an open relationship, or feel that the child may keep a separate "not for parents" account. Similar strategies could be used by someone trying to get to your child's private MySpace information.
- Ask them about their photos and make sure they understand why they must pay very close attention to the photos they post. Be sure that their are no identifiable objects or things that may zero in on a location (high school info, license plate, street signs, etc). Also be sure your child's MySpace photos are not in any way sexually suggestive. For a real shocker, view some bad MySpace profile examples here.
Step Two: Review How Your Child's Account is Setup
Part of step one was allowing your child to help setup your own MySpace account. This is important because it is a lead-in to you "naturally" discovering some things that may be of concern (if they exist, of course). We will go through those issues next but let me give you an example first: As you'll see below it is not a good idea to put your real hometown or High School into MySpace. The reason is this acts as a great location and time-spent piece of information for potential predators. There is no real reason to have this information available to the MySpace public. Your child should be sharing information on MySpace with friends they already know, who already know where they live and where they go to school. When setting up your account with your child, the lead-in is "hey, this might be a bad idea because of such and such, let's review your setup for other problems..." Review the child's Account Settings as follows:
Login and click the "Home" link. Next click on "Account Settings". Take note of the following:
eMail: Have your child use a free eMail account from Yahoo, Google, or Hotmail. Make sure they don't use their full name in the actual email address. Definitely do not use a high school email address.
Privacy Settings: Click on Privacy Settings and take note of the following MySpace privacy settings (they are all important, but these are critical):
- check "Require email or last name to add me as a friend." This makes sure that people that become your child's friend actually know your child or at least have been screened and accepted by them.
- check "Friends Only Blog Comments" to avoid some stranger posting obscenities to your child's blog
- check "My Friends Only" under Who Can View My Full Profile to ensure that your child's profile is only viewed by people they want to view it. This is not foolproof and you can see strategies to get around this setting in the stealth techniques taught to parents in the Parents Knowledge Kit for Online Child Safety.
IM Privacy Settings: If your child IMs (Instant Messages) you should change this setting to "Only Friends Can IM Me"
Step Three: Review Your Child's Entire Site
You may want to do this one on your own time when your child is not around because you'll want to closely analyze content for the above mentioned issues (location, sexual, contact info, etc.)
Now that you are a MySpace friend to your child (see How to Use MySpace if you haven't already become a friend of your child and need some help) you can simply login to your MySpace account and click on your child's profile in your "friends" section. When you get to your child's profile, take a close look at the following items which all have links from the main page:
"More Photos" link under the main upper left photo. Examine all photos your child has posted.
"Videos" link: review all videos for potentially dangerous content.
"Blog" link: review all blog entries for anything too revealing (as discussed above)
The "Friends Section" In the lower right will be your child's friends. You should see your photo or link in this section if they have made you their friend. Read the comments from your child's friends. Also, go to each of their sites and review their profiles. Remember, at this point (in your child's friend's profile) this info is open to anyone. You are just another web surfer looking at your child's friend's profile. If they have the "Friends Only" privacy setting set, you will be very limited as to what you can see since they didn't add you as a MySpace "friend." If you have concerns about a friend of your child's, you can read about some stealth techniques for viewing their private profile in The Parents Knowledge Kit for Online Child Safety.
Step Four: Monitor Your Child's Site and Participate
Remember that a teen's life changes like the seasons. Their interests change, fads change, new friends come and go, etc. It is important that you check up on the content of your child's site regularly. Even better, participate a bit by posting comments to their blog, uploading pictures, etc. It will be good for your child's online safety and good for your relationship. If you find yourself having difficulty with the lingo your child or their friends use online (even if there are a couple things you don't understand, like WOMBAT (Waste Of Money Brains And Time) or VBG (Very Big Grin) take a look at the Guide to Teen Online Lingo which is packed with over 1,200 translations of teen shorthand.
