Teens and Technology

If you keep up with the latest and greatest of all things electronic, then chances are you are under 25 and grew up with a new gadget hitting the market daily. The innovations coming out of corporate America these days have more than one connotation.

Companies are doing a large percentage of their marketing to the teenage crowd so therefore today's youth are bombarded with new ways of getting into trouble. This article is my feeble attempt at trying to educate the modern parental unit.

OK, lets start with the Internet. The Internet, according to the dictionary definition,  is a vast computer network linking smaller computer networks worldwide.  The Internet includes commercial, educational, governmental, and other networks, all of which use the same set of communications protocols. When used as it was designed, the Internet can be a great tool for businesses, education, research, and the list goes on for its good points.

We all know that when anything good comes along that sooner or later the dark side will show its ugly head. If you have an Internet connection in your home you most likely already know what I am speaking of.

Not long after the first connection to the internet was made, someone had already figured out a way to “hack” or break into another computer on the web. Since then our in-boxes have been filled to the brim with unwanted emails that want to sell us something to make that is guaranteed to make that certain part of the male anatomy larger so all the women of the world would be putty in our hands. And then there are the viruses; sneaky little robot programs that reek havoc to computers around the world. I personally think that this is a massive plot by software companies to unleash these monsters on society in order to spur sales of their latest and greatest system security program, but that is just my opinion and we all know opinions do not mean a lot except to the person who has one.

Now let me get to the reasons I am writing this editorial and talk about “social networking”.  In theory, social networking is a great idea, and a quick and easy way for family and friends to keep in contact and send photos of junior getting his first tooth. Web sites such as Myspace and Facebook are the major players in the social networking craze. By joining either of them you are allowed to create a profile with all the information you care to let the outside world know about you.

Alright, let's pay attention to this part, this is where we get back to the teenagers. The younger generation were the fist to pick up on this new concept of communication and if you have a teenager and a computer at home then chances are your child has a profile on one of these networks whether you like it or not.  Granted there is nothing wrong with kids keeping in contact with one another, but sometimes they do tend  to throw caution to the wind.  By this I mean they enter in too much information on their profile, and post images of themselves that probably should not have been taken in the first place (we will talk more about those later). By doing these things they are opening themselves up to a vast amount of dangerous people with anything but good intentions on their minds. Unless you have had your heads buried in the sand for the last 10 to 15 years you know very well what I mean.

We see it every day either on the broadcast news or in the news paper, where a child has been abducted by someone they “met” on-line; and what about those Date Line sex predator sting operation episodes? it is enough to make you want to pull the plug and go back to the “old days” of actually hand writing letters and correspondence by the good ole U.S. postal service.

On-line predators and sex offenders scour the web,  and yes, social networking sites to find their victims. According to the FBI, “Some offenders primarily collect and trade child-pornographic images, while others seek face-to-face meetings with children via on-line contacts. It is important for parents to understand that children can be indirectly victimized through conversation, i.e. "chat",  as well as the transfer of sexually explicit information and material. Computer-sex offenders may also be evaluating children they come in contact with on-line for future face-to-face contact and direct victimization. Parents and children should remember that a computer-sex offender can be any age or sex the person does not have to fit the caricature of a dirty, unkempt, older man wearing a raincoat to be someone who could harm a child”.

The FBI has a great “How To” section of their web site that deals with how to educate yourself and protect your child from sexual predators. They also offer the following tips on “What Should You Do If You Suspect Your Child Is Communicating With A Sexual Predator On-line?”

(These tips were taken directly from the FBI website.)

Consider talking openly with your child about your suspicions. Tell them about the dangers of computer-sex offenders.
Review what is on your child's computer. If you don't know how, ask a friend, coworker, relative, or other knowledgeable person. Pornography or any kind of sexual communication can be a warning sign.

Use the Caller ID service to determine who is calling your child. Most telephone companies that offer Caller ID also offer a service that allows you to block your number from appearing on someone else's Caller ID. Telephone companies also offer an additional service feature that rejects incoming calls that you block. This rejection feature prevents computer-sex offenders or anyone else from calling your home anonymously.

Devices can be purchased that show telephone numbers that have been dialed from your home phone. Additionally, the last number called from your home phone can be retrieved provided that the telephone is equipped with a redial feature. You will also need a telephone pager to complete this retrieval.
 
This is done using a numeric-display pager and another phone that is on the same line as the first phone with the redial feature. Using the two phones and the pager, a call is placed from the second phone to the pager. When the paging terminal beeps for you to enter a telephone number, you press the redial button on the first (or suspect) phone. The last number called from that phone will then be displayed on the pager.
 
Monitor your child's access to all types of live electronic communications (i.e., chat rooms, instant messages, Internet Relay Chat, etc.), and monitor your child's e-mail. Computer-sex offenders almost always meet potential victims via chat rooms. After meeting a child on-line, they will continue to communicate electronically often via e-mail.

What Can You Do To Minimize The Chances Of An On-line Exploiter Victimizing Your Child?

*Communicate, and talk to your child about sexual victimization and potential on-line danger.

*Spend time with your children on-line. Have them teach you about their favorite on-line destinations.
 
*Keep the computer in a common room in the house, not in your child's bedroom. It is much more difficult for a computer-sex offender to communicate with a child when the computer screen is visible to a parent or another member of the household.

*Utilize parental controls provided by your service provider and/or blocking software. While electronic chat can be a great place for children to make new friends and discuss various topics of interest, it is also prowled by computer-sex offenders. Use of chat rooms, in particular, should be heavily monitored. While parents should utilize these mechanisms, they should not totally rely on them.

*Always maintain access to your child's on-line account and randomly check his/her e-mail. Be aware that your child could be contacted through the U.S. Mail. Be up front with your child about your access and reasons why.

*Teach your child the responsible use of the resources on-line. There is much more to the on-line experience than chat rooms.

*Find out what computer safeguards are utilized by your child's school, the public library, and at the homes of your child's friends. These are all places, outside your normal supervision, where your child could encounter an on-line predator.

*Understand, even if your child was a willing participant in any form of sexual exploitation, that he/she is not at fault and is the victim. The offender always bears the complete responsibility for his or her actions.
 
Instruct your children:
*to never arrange a face-to-face meeting with someone they met on- line;
*to never upload (post) pictures of themselves onto the Internet or on-line service to people they do not personally know;
*to never give out identifying information such as their name, home address, school name, or telephone number;
*to never download pictures from an unknown source, as there is a good chance there could be sexually explicit images;
*to never respond to messages or bulletin board postings that are suggestive, obscene, belligerent, or harassing;
that whatever they are told on-line may or may not be true
.
For more information on this topic I recommend you visit the FBI web site by typing in the following web address; http://www.fbi.gov/publications/pguide/pguidee.htm

What about cellphones?

Cell phones have mostly replaced the now antiquated pay-phone. When most of us were teenagers, we would have to search for a location that had a payphone in order to call home, and then dig around in the car to find enough change to drop down the slot to make the call.

With the advent of the cell phone, we became able to call or be called at a moments notice. Great idea right?  Well, if cell phones were used as they were intended , then yes,  they are one of the greatest inventions since sliced bread, but we all know what happens to “great inventions”.

As with anything else the human race takes everything to extremes despite the dangerous consequences. When was the last time you drove through town and not seen someone driving down the road with a cell phone up to their ear? I have even been on the interstate and had people pass me (keep in mind I was doing the posted speed limit of 65), while they were holding a cell phone with one hand, writing on a notepad with the other and driving with their knee, talk about multi tasking! My point is, there is nothing so important that you can't pull over to talk on the phone, avoiding the risk of driving up a tree or worse yet, slamming your car into someone else.

Now that we have my little rant out of the way, let's get back to the kids. We all want to be able to contact our kids at any time while they are exploring the world. Cell phones are the best tool for the job right? True, all we have to do is dial up their number and with just a couple of rings they answer and we instantly know they are alive and well which makes us feel all warm and fuzzy inside,  just before we argue with them regarding why they are out past their curfew.

Every generation has had their bout with adolescents, and the trials and tribulations are for the most part always the same. The only difference between the current generation of teenagers and those that came before them is the fact that they have a lot more ways to get into trouble.

As with the Internet, parents need to be diligent when it comes to teens and cell phone usage. When looking for a cell phone plan for your teen, you should stop and think just for a moment and decide how your teen is most likely to use the new gadget that they now hold in their young hands.

We have already determined that being able to call our kids at anytime was a good thing. But, what about all the other options you can purchase along with their new cell phone plan?

Ask yourself, does my kid need options such as text messaging, camera phone, email access, etc...Now as innocent as these options may seem, maybe, just maybe they are not a great idea for a teenager to have access to.

Let's start with text messaging. I may be old fashioned, but think about it; it is a telephone for heavens sake, if you need to tap out a message that takes a couple of minutes to key in would it not be just as simple to just dial the darn number and speak to the person? It seems pretty pointless to me.

Now let's think for a moment like a teenager for a moment. With having the ability of being able to text a friend, you can do it anytime you want like when you are in class at school and you just have to tell your friend Betty that Johnny just broke up with Suzy or the answer to question number 20 on the English Literature test is Edgar Allen Poe. Hmm, come to think of it that last one might have come in handy back when I was going to school. We all hope that our children would not cheat, but let's face it, they are children and children do not always think before they leap, or text as the case may be.

Moving right along we come to the addition of having a camera phone. Granted there are many instances where camera phones have come in handy, for instance quickly being able to whip out the camera phone to snap a photo or video of a crime in progress, or when you go house hunting and want to capture an image of that huge living room for future reference. Now put that same camera phone in the hands of a teenager and then you will see the real pitfalls of the ability of being able to snap a photo or video and send it to a “friend” in an instant.

There have been several news stories recently regarding teens and the use or misuse rather of camera phones. Photos of a sexual nature have been taken and then transmitted to one person and that person sends it on to another and that person forwards the image to another and before you know it, that very photo that was meant to be seen by only one person has been seen by many and even some that the original sender may not even know.

Of course, today's teens are surrounded by sexually related content that can easily be seen on the Internet, in magazine advertisements, and even at the local mall where risqué posters are prominently displayed in storefront windows of trendy stores. Because they may be curious about sex and the human body, children/adolescents sometimes use their on-line access as well as their cell phone to actively seek out such material. That being said, are we as parents opening a doorway to our children that is best left closed?

Every red blooded teen aged male and a growing number of females, whether we would like to believe it or not has but one goal. In the process of achieving their goal they often let the wrong part of their body do the thinking, therefore the decisions they make are often the wrong ones that have serious and now legal consequences.

Take the scenario that we just covered regarding a teen taking a risqué photo and sending it to a friend. Not only has the photo now made the rounds from cell phone to cell phone or even worse yet been posted on the Internet; but everyone involved has now, because of strict laws regarding child pornography, become a sex offender in the eyes of the law. If convicted, those involved will now most likely have to register as a sex offender which will follow them for the rest of their life.

It is imperative that we as parents not bury or heads in the sand and hope for the best out of our children. We need to be proactive so we do not end up having to be reactive to situations they may or may not get themselves into...