How to Protect Your Children While They’re Online? Since the technology hit our doors, it has always been warmly welcomed by the kids more than the adults. Kids always find technology to be the most amazing thing they have ever got. In today’s world, the children use the internet technology for their school projects, gaming or socialization and restraining them away from the technology will worsen the matter only.
This has brought some serious concerns for the parents. It is because all that glitters in the online world are not gold. And kids can barely understand this. Hence, the concerned parents look upon to the internet. Finding the ways to protect their kids online. If we caught you right and you are one of those parents. That constantly have nightmares about the online threat harming your children. Then you are in right place. Here I come with a couple of rules and tips. That can be a real help to protect your children online.
Why Is It Important To Protect Kids When They go Online?
Furthermore, Inevitably protecting children when they go online. It is a matter of grave concerns. Reason being, the children are not as well aware of the internet world as we are. Therefore, they do not know about the threats on the internet. That can harm them and even their family. So the parents must play their vital role in protecting their kids while they are online.
What Are the Threats That Can Harm Your Children Online?
Moreover, One of the most wreckable threats to your children’s personality is sexual abuse. Over the internet and pornography. You can not even imagine how long-lasting the effects of sexual assault could be. It causes a damaging effect on the child’s personality. Also, it can be a reason behind his or her shattered confidence. And insecurity that can last lifelong. Whereas the pornography has just a few keystrokes away on the internet. Its impact on the child’s life is hazardous. Furthermore, this isn’t just stopped here. Your child is left unattended with the internet. Can become the victim of cybercrime. Unquestionably, kids are not aware of the cybercriminal activities and how they can harm them. Hence, leaving your children vulnerable to these terrible threats is not at all wise.
How To Prevent them from Online Threat?
Well, protecting anything never comes easy. You need to be extra cautious and watchful every time your children go near the computer to protect your children online but remember not to isolate them from using the internet. You will require to set some strict rules in your home and keep a strict supervision over whether or not someone from your children is breaking the rules. Following are some nifty advice and tips that will prove to be a good help for you to protect your children online.
-
Go For the Most Suitable VPN
VPN or Virtual Private Network is widely famous for internet security. It is mainly designed to provide a safe and secure connection by using a high level of end-to-end encryption. Using VPN will always save you and your children from being the victim of any cybercriminal activity like hacking, malware, spyware or adware, etc. Always ensure to turn on the VPN when your children are using the internet and never let them use the public Wifi as it can make them vulnerable to the hackers and spammers to protect your children online.
All the niche VPNs automatically blocks the malicious content and link that seem harmful for the system and can breed the cybercrime. VPN is also capable of blocking unwanted and inappropriate ads. So using a VPN can protect your child to some extent but you also have to keep an eye on the pages that your child is visiting and do not let him click any link that can redirect him to any malicious content (see the most secure VPN services).
2. Parental Control Software
Parental Control Software PCS seems a good option and is being greatly used by many parents to protect their children online. This software is designed to hide and block all kind of inappropriate stuff that is available over the internet without even letting your children know about all these stuff exist on the internet. This software also enables you to monitor the online activity of your children and get to know about the websites they are visiting, persons they are talking to and games they are playing. In short with the help of this software you can take control of your children online world and manage it as you want to do it to protect your children online in a better way.
3. Limit their Social Media Access
Do you know why is there an age restriction on Facebook and other social networking sites? This is because social networking is not meant for children under 18 years old. But these days, nobody cares about the age restrictions, and there are many accounts on Facebook and Twitter that are being run by the children.
This way, the parents are not doing something good for their children rather they are harming them. Their tender age is not capable of judging people over the social networking sites. Therefore, you are advised to limit the social networking sites access of your children and involve them with real-life friends of their age to protect your children online.
4. Communicate To Your Children About Their Online Experiences
There must not be any communication barrier between you and your children. You, as a parent, should be amiable enough so that your children feel a comfort zone and share their online experiences with you. In fact, edify your kids to tell you everything that is happening in their life and try to become their best friend so that they will never hesitate telling something humiliating to you. This way you can always be acquainted with the things that are going on in your child’s life, and if something is alarming, you can fix it before it gets worst.
5. Aware Your Kids About the Sensitivity of Private Information
Today’s dubious world demands us to be careful when it comes to disclosing the personal details of our family. The children should also be taken on board regarding the sensitivity of personal and financial information of the household. You ought to communicate this to your children to never give any stranger the private information like home address, computer accounts credentials and different financial accounts details. You should raise your kids smart enough not even to share their phone number with strangers over the internet. And sharing their picture should be a big NO. The more they stay limited, the safer they are on the internet.
6. Location Of the Computer also Matters!
It may sound unimportant to you, but in order to protect your children online from the imminent threats on the internet, it is essential to consider placing your PC in an appropriate location. The right area for setting your PC can be a room that is in the middle of your house and is mostly crowded with the family members. You should always avoid placing the computer in children’s room for they can access it anytime in your absence. So, choose that area of your house where you spend most of your time so that you can keep an eye on your kids how they are making the use of internet technology. This requires you to be very cautious especially when the children are with their favourite friend “technology.”
7. Seek Help of Your ISP
Look upon to your ISP in order to keep a check on your children’s online activity. Before spending money on parental software, do check with your ISP first. There are some ISPs like Earthlink, SBC Yahoo or MSN; they offer free parental control features that will allow you to block the inappropriate content from the server and set an age limit on the chat room, social networking sites, etc to protect your children online. This way you can prevent your children from being the victim of internet threats and make your children safe over the internet.
8. Give Task To Your Search Engine
If the ISP idea does not work in your case, then you can seek help of the search engine. But you should be careful if you are the parent of savvy children who can deftly go into settings and turn them back. Prefer using Google as your search engine because it can block the off-limit content once you setup the required settings. Go to Preference >Safesearch>Filtering. So filtering the content that your children view is a good idea to protect your children online.
9. Turn Up Your Browser
For added safety, you can work with your browser. The browsers like Internet Explorer are featured with some safe surfing options that can be a useful help for you. Internet Explorer comes with a content advisor that can be accessed by going to Tools /Internet Options / Content. The function of this feature is to filter the nudity, violence content and languages for the minors and set up the age limit barrier. Likewise, Netscape and Safari also offer such filter especially appended for parental control to protect your children online. However, your browser cannot render you the level of service that any purchased parental control software or even your ISP can provide, but its safe-surfing option can be promptly availed when you are sitting right beside your children while they surf the website to avoid any awkward moment.
10. Find Lock and Key for the Internet
Here I come with the lock and key for your internet. ControlKey 2.0 is a key to your Internet although the lock is something that you have to set up. All you need to do is to plug this tiny blue device into a USB slot, and this USB will work as a key for your internet lock. Once this USB is connected, the internet becomes unrestricted and open to all. But when the USB is removed, it is locked, and only predefined websites can be accessed. You need to set a list of websites for your children that you think are safe for your children. While the key is not inserted, all your children can access is the listed websites you decided for them. This can serve you as a watchdog, and you can monitor and control your children’s online activity to protect your children online.
Bottom Line- How to Protect Your Children While They’re Online?
No matter how many expensive software you purchase and set up, the most secure firewall between your kids and the online threats is none other than YOU. Yes, your behaviour is a parent counts in the prevention against the online threat that can cause damage to your children’s personality. Every parent should be vigilant enough to smell the danger when it is farther to your children. However, you should not become overprotective for it can irritate your children and they can start hiding things from you. And if it happens, the situation will be more likely to slip from your hands. Hence, you should adopt a very calm but watchful attitude to protect your children online.
