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What's Happening Next Door?
Establishing Internet Rules for Home and Away
By Laura Paul
Donna Rice Hughes, the author of Kids Online: Protecting Your Children in Cyberspace (Revell, 1998), says it is important to establish the rules of the road for Internet use at home and then talk to children about how important it is to follow those rules at other people's homes even when they may not have those rules in place.
Hughes has received a Congressional appointment to serve on the Child Online Protection Committee and made recommendations on filtering/rating/labeling technologies. Her organization, Enough Is Enough, is a national organization that works to make the Internet safer for children and families.
"Quite frankly once your children leave your home, you really can't protect them with respect to making sure you have good filters on the computer and chat rooms are set up appropriately or blocked or that the IM (instant message) situation is under control," says Hughes. She strongly suggests parents prohibit their children from going into chat rooms where sexual predators may be lurking under an anonymous screen name.
"There is no way you can protect them in chat rooms," Hughes says. "You cannot detect a disguised predator, and I've discussed that with AOL (America Online) and everyone else. It cannot be done. If a predator is watching chat and in a session and they don't reveal themselves or even if they do, they can pretend to be someone else. Even an adult-monitored chat room can't tell who is there." Hughes also encourages parents to help set up a child's "buddy list" and make sure only approved people may send the child an instant message.
