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Can you protect your children?

She was 14. But as far as her Internet admirers knew, the teen was a fun-loving woman in her 20s.
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She was 14. But as far as her Internet admirers knew, the teen was a fun-loving woman in her 20s.

“She started to be rebellious about 13,” says the teen’s stepmother. “It started with the computer, going on the computer and connecting with guys there, older men, in their 20s at least.”

The name of the girl and her stepmother must remain anonymous. But the Red Deer woman wanted to share her experiences as a warning to other parents about the dangers that are just a few mouse clicks and keyboard strokes away.

The parents did everything they could to rein in her online activities, which included sending racy photos. They grounded her and took away her computer, but she just went to a friend’s house or used computers in public facilities such as the Collicutt Centre.

They got counsellors at her high school involved and urged the police to investigate.

Her online connections may never have known what a dangerous game they were playing. She eventually did tell police about a 20-year-old she had met, this time not online. He was later convicted for having sexual relations with her and was sentenced to two years in prison.

The girl is now a young mother at 16, living with an 18-year-old boyfriend.

Looking back at the experience, the stepmother offers some advice.

“The cellphone was our worst nightmare,” she says, adding it just made it too easy for the teen to meet up with the wrong people.

Home computers must also be treated with caution, she says. “Parents need to know when the kids are at a young age exactly what the kids are doing on the computer.”

Her stepdaughter was not the only one in her group lying about their age online to meet older men, she says.

She believes computers in public places need to be governed more strictly, especially when they are near high schools.

RCMP Cpl. Kathe DeHeer says police are routinely asked to launch investigations by alarmed parents.

“We get an awful lot of complaints that are Internet-related and social networking-related by parents,” said DeHeer.

“There’s a lot of parents out there who don’t know what’s going on in their kids’ bedrooms on their computers,” she said. “And they don’t monitor or police what’s going on, and then there is a lot of shock when they find out what their kids are actually doing on these computers.”

Some parents are worried about suspect online relationships or evidence of porn site visits. Complaints about online threats and bullying are also common.

Online relationships can be particularly risky.

“People have to understand you have no way of knowing who the person on the other end of that computer is. It could be an online predator. It could be a lot of different things. That’s something parents should be monitoring very closely on a daily basis to ensure they know what their children are up to on these computers.”

Ralph Cervi, a former RCMP officer who now works for the Crisis Centre in Red Deer, travels Central Alberta giving talks to thousands of school children a year on sexual assault, healthy relationships, dating violence and Internet safety.

He has plenty of stories about online dangers. In one case, a teenage girl working in a restaurant in a small eastern Alberta town gave her Facebook contact information to someone she had befriended from a pipeline crew working in the area. Later, another man who saw her picture through that Facebook connection became enamoured with her and travelled across Alberta to find her. He ended up in her town with an online photo trying to track her down by posing as a relative.

“That alone is creepy, but finding out he was more than twice her age — if that doesn’t send warning flags up then nothing will,” says Cervi.

Fortunately, in this case a relative of the girl became suspicious of this stranger asking questions and the police were contacted. They had a chat with the man, although he could not be charged with a crime.

In another case, someone posing as a girl’s cousin requested updated photos from his “cuz” in a chat room. When asked why, the person replied that he wanted to see how much she had changed in the last year.

“That really sent some red flags up for her so she actually phoned her cousin and found out that her cousin wasn’t online. Someone had hacked into his account and was pretending to be him.

“That happens quite often actually.”

For parents, Cervi’s message is simple. “Parents have to learn as much as their kids know.”

That means sitting down and talking to kids about what they are doing online. Get them to show you their favourite sites and make it part of a means to communicate with them about their lives and build a stronger relationship.

“Sometimes parents think that if they let their kids know that they don’t know, they’re in a position of weakness. But it’s really the other way round.”

Local school districts have been quick to ensure online safety and etiquette have become a regular part of classroom instruction.

Ron Eberts, assistant superintendent for learning services at the Red Deer Public School District, says the topic is raised at elementary school and is part of education right through high school.

The focus isn’t only on staff and students. Workshops have also been held for parents at school council meetings to give them an idea of what to look out for and how to address issues that arise.

The top advice from school officials: keep computers out of children’s bedrooms. Making the computer station part of the family’s living area is the best way to deter youngsters from going down potentially dangerous online roads.

It also allows parents to see what sites their children are on and can use that to generate discussions about online issues.

“It’s not that were talking about mistrust or anything,” said Eberts. “But especially with younger kids, and even teenagers, sometimes they don’t realize the gravity of some of the decisions they make online.”

Whenever students are online as part of classroom research, safety routinely becomes part of the discussion. For instance, students are taught to identify how to verify the authenticity of the people with whom they are communicating. Youngsters are also warned about putting personal information on the Internet or accepting strangers as friends on sites like Facebook.

The reality is many young people lie about their age to get on sites such as Facebook, where users are supposed to be 14. Eberts said he has asked middle school classes how many of them have pretended to be older online and it is surprising how many hands go up.

There’s a certain naivete among youngsters about fudging their age and the risks they could face. That’s why students are taught that all is not as it may seem online.

At Chinook’s Edge School Division, Internet safety falls under an initiative called Digital Citizenship.

“Digital citizenship provides students with the knowledge and the skills they need to navigate the web,” said Michelle Khatib, director of educational technology for the school division. “It’s very vital our teachers are teaching that.”

All librarians and technology integration leaders are trained on digital citizenship and services are available to train teachers.

But the school division doesn’t want to be the only ones bringing the message to children.

“I think it’s imperative parents have a strong understanding themselves and model this for their children.”

A parental site has been developed at www.cesddc.pbworks.com to help. Among the tools available is a passport to the Internet for Grade 4 to Grade 8 students where they can experience a chat room, learn how to message or research, and other online scenarios.

“We don’t want it just being a one-shot time where people go in and teach it for the month of September. We want it embedded into everything we do.”

There are nine elements of digital citizenship covering everything from etiquette and commerce to rights and responsibilities and security. “We have to make sure that (students) understand it well, that our teachers understand it well, but we really need to ensure our parents understand it.

“Students need to be really clear how their parents feel about it as well. Those discussions need to happen.”

Other useful sites include: www.digitalcitizenship.net and www.commonsensemedia.org.

pcowley@www.reddeeradvocate.com