And that’s just the ones who were — excuse me — stupid enough to put their name out there for the authorities to see. I would think it would be virtually impossible to discover the ones who were a little more discrete.

This should be a wake-up call to caring parents who need to know what danger lies within this community. I’m not making a blanket statement that MySpace is all bad, but if you spend a few moments browsing the profiles you see on there it wouldn’t be long before you come across something, shall we say, unsavory.

Just like cyberbullying, the Web offers a feeling of freedom not normally found in the offline world. Just as it’s easy to harass someone online using the Web and be anonymous, so too is the feeling one has when they are in the comfort of their own bedrooms providing all sorts of data for all the world to see.

What can you do?

• Ask your child if they have a profile on MySpace. If they do, try not to freak (again, I’m not saying everyone on MySpace is bad), but ask to see it and judge for yourself if it contains appropriate material.
• Set guidelines for what is appropriate and what is not appropriate to put on their profile.
• Have them require visitors to be part of their network, thus requiring a login. At least this way some control is involved with who can see the information. And have them connect with only friends they know in real life.

I’ve viewed profiles on MySpace and have witnessed first hand that kids can put content of themselves that they wouldn’t think of showing mom and dad in a million years. Provocative poses, shots of inappropriate behavior, information about where they go to school or live, their cell phone number, and lots more.

What I’m suggesting here is not to eliminate their freedom of expression. I don’t think that’s even possible with kids today even if we tried. But it’s more about teaching them the difference between right and wrong. So many times kids think it’s only their friends who are viewing their information on their profiles. Not so, unless they’ve only limited their profile to be viewed by their friends.

[tags]MySpace,sex offenders,pedophiles[/tags]

Well, I just learned of some more trouble. According to an article in the New York Times, a former Vice President of Stickam, Alex Becker, has accused the company of not doing enough to protect their members. In fact, the same company shares office space — and sometimes employees — with online porn companies.

The parent company of Stickam is Advanced Video Communications. They own several popular pornographic web sites, some using web cam technology.

So what?

Whether or not the allegations Mr. Becker is making are true, it cannot be denied the danger that lies ahead for unsupervised teens using a service such as Stickam. I’m sure there are many people who use it responsibly; I’m not worried about them. My concern is for those who are being rebellious or adventurous. The article also reported that people are frequently asked to remove their clothing.

Bottom line

Kids alone with computers in the privacy of their own bedroom can be a potentially dangerous mix. And that word “private” doesn’t really mean much, does it? After all, that web cam is a window into their room. Even without the web cam, the computer is just that: a window into your home.

What’s your response? Am I being too harsh on Stickam?

[tags]stickam,web cam,technology,family,teens,privacy[/tags]

But as easy as it is to find porn on the Web, it’s not that difficult to find help to break the addiction to it. No matter if you’re young or old, boy or girl, man or woman, you can fight against this scourge.

These sites are meant to help with that fight, which is why I’m making them my FWW Spotlight #4.

Teens Against Pornography
We usually hear about adults suffering from the addiction to porn or struggling with their sexual purity. But this site’s about teens and their addiction and struggles. I congratulate them for stopping this sort of behavior before it takes root and alters the lives quite possibly forever.

This is a very active place as shown by the forum with over 3,000 posts. The people there are very supportive and other resources are listed on related topics.

Higher-Calling
This site was started by John, and is geared more toward adults. And what a great resource it is! I found this site a little over a year ago and glad to see it’s still thriving. It has a very active forum with loads of people sharing their troubles and just as many people who are trying to help them out of their darkness. This is definitely one to bookmark for porn addiction sufferers.

Partners for Purity
Read this post in their forum and you’ll get a sense of what this site is all about. Truly heartbreaking, but uplifting at the same time. Porn addiction is hard enough for the person suffering from it, but what about the spouse? They feel betrayed, left to wonder if they’re still married to the person they once knew, if they’ll ever hold that special place in their spouse’s heart again.

With the proliferation of photos and videos online designed to focus on the flesh and how extremely easy it is to find such content, it’s no wonder why so many are affected by this scourge. After all, it’s not as though you’re actually with another person, right? Well, in my opinion, it is and that’s why we must stay strong and seek out resources such as the ones I’ve listed here.

[tags]porn addiction,marriage[/tags]

According to some statistics I found, approximately “28,258 Internet users are viewing pornography” every second! The word “sex” was searched on 75,608,612 last year. And there are about 4.2 million porn-related sites online today, and that number is sure to be growing at a rapid rate everyday.

My friends at Blogger Power aren’t looking to restrict free speech. But they are pleading to porn site owners to use common sense by simply “wrapping” their material much like a pornographic magazine wraps their’s in plastic. It’s so simple to require some form of age authentication on these sites (like requiring a credit card). I guess they’re just afraid reducing their site’s exposure no matter if it means that a child may land on it.

Even something as simple as requiring a password can deter young eyes. Anything to keep the material as far away from them as possible. Surely, porn site owners have to admit that their business will not crumble if they do something about this.

What can you do? Well, if you’re a blogger post your support on your blog for the common decency one should take to protecting our children from adult content. Then show your support on BP’s blog. If you’re not a blogger, but are of voting age, then you can contact your local state representatives and let them know that you want them to do more to fight porn.

[tags]porn,pornography,common sense,responsibility[/tags]

Now, there are times when I don’t think it’s appropriate for government to get involved with family matters. There are definitely times when it shouldn’t happen. But this is one of those cases where they need to be involved because I’m convinced that there are more parents who don’t make a significant effort to protecting their children online than those who do.

We put age restrictions on so many other things: drinking, voting, driving, etc. Why should online porn be the exception?

It’s just too easy for anyone to land on a site with inappropriate material, and this is especially true for people who aren’t even trying to find it. With sites like MySpace and even eBay, kids could enter these places with no intention whatsoever of finding porn, but finding it just the same, and in the case of eBay, buying it.

Looking at this from another angle, this means that Senior U.S. District Judge Lowell Reed Jr. ruled in favor of the supporters for free access to online porn. The law would have required credit cards to be entered as a form of age verification before entering an adult site.

So, what’s the trouble with that? Comparing this to a kid attempting to walk into a bar, you know he’s going to be stopped to show some ID to prove he’s of age. Why is online porn any different?

Alas, that would just get in the way of an adult trying to get at some eye-candy.

So what can you do to minimize the chance of you or your family from accessing online porn?

• Install an Internet filter, also known as parental control software. You have a lot of choices, some of which I’ve written about here.
• Know that it’s really very easy to fall into this sort of content by accident. I use StumbleUpon frequently and even though I’ve configured it to avoid adult content, there are times when images show up that I’d be embarrassed to have my children see if they walked in the room. So even the best of intentions are not 100 percent perfect.
• Configure Yahoo! and Google to place strict filtering on search results. This could be changed by the child, but you need to know that protection is there nonetheless.
• And last, but not least, subscribe to my feed.

[tags]porn,internet safety,judge,[/tags]

I don’t see the connection to calling it an “injury”, but the way things played out is she received permission from the usual teacher to use the computer, who incidentally, forgot to logout. When Amero left the class briefly, she returned to find the children gathered round the computer. Much to her surprise, she panicked when she saw pornographic images popping up on the screen.

Now, Amero claims that she did nothing to cause these to display. Based on what I’ve read, I tend to agreed with her. Here’s why.

Why would someone risk losing their job by initiating such activity? Furthermore, why would they do it with a room full of school-aged children? It just doesn’t make sense to me.

The school admitted to not keeping their firewall license current and that the antivirus software on the computer was way out of date. Well duh! That’s an accident just waiting to happen.

An expert brought in to defend Amero would have testified that the system was also infected with adware and spyware. I say “would have testified” were it not for some technicality that caused his testimony to never make it to court. (Those darn technicalities!)

Based on the information, I don’t see how a school would allow someone to take the fall for their own inactions. Let me rephrase that: I can see why they wouldn’t want to have their pants sued off by the children’s families, but seriously, stand up and do the right thing!

Does your kid’s school have current protection on the computers they use? Do they have policies in place that explain what a teacher and a child should and should not do on the computers at school? And have they taken appropriate measures to enforce those policies?

Inspired by: ars technica

[tags]internet safety,porn,teacher,school[/tags]

Overall, I think Veoh has a good interface with which to find topics of interest, but it’s all too easy to find videos that, in my opinion, are inappropriate for young eyes. While I didn’t find nudity, some of the clips came awful close. Young women dressed in skimpy clothing, posing seductively, and bearing more than I think a parent would feel comfortable with if their child were sitting there with them watching. Not that that’s what Veoh is all about. There are tons of other clips from well-known TV shows, cartoons, and more.

But even taking all that into consideration, and in comparison to YouTube or MySpace, I have to say that Veoh does rate a little higher in my book because it does appear that the site owners are doing a better job of monitoring their content.

Parents should beware that this site, just like the aforementioned sites, are very appealing to teens, in particular. This appeal is, in part, due to their desire to express themselves and find other like-minded teens. Plus, it gives them bragging rights to their friends (“Look what I posted!”). So if you’re teen is someone who likes to dance around in their pajamas with their girlfriend to a gangsta rap song, then this may be a place for them.

What? I’m not making this up. The Web brings all kinds together and so I’m not kidding when I say that I found two girls videotaping themselves as described above. Without getting into too much detail, suffice it to say that I got the impression that either one of the girl’s parents weren’t home or were just clueless to have let this go on.

Now, this scenario should disturb parents, not that it was a vulgar video (although, the rap song was trash), but that these girls were thinking more of the “coolness” of the act than the actual consequences of it. Remember, sites like Veoh, Myspace, and YouTube are the equivalent of window-shopping to tech-savvy pedophiles. Searching is easy, so you can hone in on an alarmingly granular level. You find the video, you comment on it, the kid who posted might be curious enough to respond, maybe even strike up a conversation via other means.

Parental tips

• Even if you don’t think your child would post anything about themselves online, let alone a video, talk to them about it anyway.
• You have less control over what your child does at a friend’s house, so set ground rules with your child.
• Ask the friend’s parent if they’ll have unsupervised access to the Internet and request that they be supervised if they’re going to use it at all.
• What a kid knows to be wrong at home may actually go unnoticed or seem not so harmful at a friend’s house. To avoid being labeled “uncool”, kids could be under a lot of pressure to comply with the request of others. So maybe a reminder wouldn’t hurt.

And these aren’t dirty old men in trench coats waiting to flash passersby. As I’ve stated here many times, they’re successful people, prominent people with high-paying jobs, respectable jobs — with despicable interests.

In case you haven’t seen the show, an actress (of legal age, mind you) is paid by MSNBC to pose as a 13-year-old girl in a chat room. Like moths to a flame, predators come to speak in no-uncertain terms about wanting to do sexual things with her. She tells them her age, and invites them to her home claiming that her parents are away. Well, her parents aren’t home, but a camera crew is.

The invited shows up to find the girl. They exchange a few words and she makes a quick exit to “change into something more comfortable” and out comes TV correspondent, Chris Hansen, wanting to talk with the man asking why he’s there. By then it’s too late. The cops are waiting to arrest him.

Some of these predators have feelings of remorse:

Officer: And it was a set-up. Why did you come if it wasn’t to have sex with a 13-year-old girl?

Predator: Just, you know, I was being naive. I didn’t think it would actually happen. I just ruined my entire life over something I knew was wrong. There’s no explanation. There’s no excuses. Everything I’ve worked for up until now and here on out is destroyed. Because—

Officer: ‘Cause you wanted to have sex with a 13-year-old girl.

Predator: ‘Cause I didn’t use my head.

Another predator tries to deny it outright:

Hansen: I’ve got entire transcript here. And no place does it say that she’s 19. I mean, you can go through it. If you find it you can tell me.

Predator: No, no. I believe you. How old did she say she was?

Hansen: 13.

Predator: Wow. Are you serious?

Hansen: She says that right off the get go here.

Predator: I was actually home at that time really drunk.

Hansen: Right.

Predator: I probably didn’t even pay attention to that.

Hansen: So you didn’t even notice that she was 13.

Predator: I didn’t.

Hansen: Yeah.

Parental tip

This stuff is real folks. If your child has had any experience, whatsoever, with chatting online, make sure you strike up a conversation with them to find out more. In fact, don’t wait — just do it now to set them straight early.

According to a study done by i-SAFE, 10 percent of teens have been approached online by strangers soliciting sex. That doesn’t mean these kids are to blame. What it does mean is that people are out there who are clever and try to break down a kid’s common sense in an effort to satisfy their (the predator’s) urges. Chat rooms and instant messaging are the tools of choice to get into your home and drive a wedge between you and your child. Close that door now!

Start talking and keep talking with your child to warn them of the dangers that await them online and to keep tabs on where they’ve been. The Web isn’t all bad; you just need to know how to navigate it.

Viewing the site with parental eyes, I got to thinking about some of the stuff that’s sold there and how a teen might be able to circumvent suspicion from mom and dad. Not that they would have to necessarily apply sinister tactics, but with a name like eBay, parents might not be aware of all that’s sold there.

Specifically, it’s the photos that you can buy there that concern me. You can buy tons of photos of attractive young women in suggestive poses, inexpensively, too. These are sure to catch the eyes of interested male teens everywhere.

eBay does have a policy about what you can’t sell on their site. In fact, an excerpt of their policy reads as follows:

Materials adult in nature or otherwise not appropriate for minors (individuals under 18 years of age) may only be listed in eBay’s Mature Audiences area. Some items, though legal to sell to adults are still restricted….eBay requires that a user provide credit card information or alternative verification in order to enter the Mature Audiences area.

That’s good. At least they recognize that while there are people who wish to buy and sell such materials, it’s not appropriate for individuals under 18, therefore they do what they can to restrict access to such things.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m not bashing eBay at all. It’s a fantastic site and I applaud them for their ingenuity and great service. However, I just want to make parents aware that it is possible for teens to obtain these sorts of things.

“So what?” you might ask. “These girls have got their clothes on and it doesn’t hurt to look at a pretty girl.” Sure, but consider these few points:

• This could be the beginning of online pornography addiction. The further down this road you travel, the more difficult it will be to take the next exit ramp.
• I’m making an educated guess here, and I have no information to back this up, BUT I can imagine that once a purchase has been made, the seller could offer the buyer a chance to purchase other more explicit material not on eBay. Kind of like the way a drug dealer might entice a kid with something to get them hooked to buy more drugs.
• And if you believe that scenario, what if the seller asked the buyer to either pose or submit photos of someone else for money?! I’m not kidding here and I’m not saying the it’s happening on eBay. All I’m saying is there are some dirty people out there that care only of themselves.
• Consider the girls posing for these photos. I suppose it’s possible they could have given their permission to be posted on eBay. But, IMHO, I thinks it’s more plausible to think that they might not have even considered the possibility of having such worldwide exposure. What you do in private should stay private.
• If you have a daughter, would you want her to be posing this way?

Higher-Calling.com offers articles, helpful links, Bible studies, and more to help people out of the dark tunnel that is pornography. But one of the greatest strengths it has to offer, I think, is its forum. When users visit this community they are introduced to and perhaps even surprised by knowing that there are others just like them who suffer the same obsession. For those still uncertain about sharing their dark secret, they can take comfort knowing that they’re not alone, and perhaps take something with them that will make them whole again.

The honesty I encountered there is nothing less than amazing. This self-help community is very encouraging to its members and treats everyone with respect. When someone has “fallen back into old habits”, they post about it. When they do, they get plenty of support in return to help defend themselves the next time they feel the urge to click among the galleries that deal in this trade.

If you or someone you know suffers from this obsession, look into Higher-Calling.com, and start looking toward the brighter side of the Internet and to a brighter future.