Today, a huge amount of a child’s entertainment, education, and socialization is delivered through the internet. Children are increasingly online and, for the most part, given full digital independence. Unfortunately, this leaves them susceptible to a host of different online threats, from encountering inappropriate content to coming into contact with online predators.
For this reason, you must carry out checks, implement preventative measures, and regularly monitor online activity to ensure your child stays safe online. Here are some practical methods you can implement to protect your child from online threats:
Monitor their online activity
The most straightforward way to protect your children from online threats is to monitor their activity. This can be done in several ways, the most obvious of which is simply to watch their phones, tablets, and desktops as they surf the web. By doing this, you can ensure they’re only visiting age-appropriate sites and/or communicating with friends and family.
While this method works, it can be very time-consuming, especially given how many hours children spend online per day. A simpler way would be to regularly check the search history of their phones and tablets as well as the history saved to the family desktop.
While checking search history works for monitoring websites visited, it doesn’t provide you with sufficient scope on your child’s social media activity. To monitor who they interact with online, you should get a phone spy app. Spy apps, like the ones picked out by Aleksandar Stevanovic at techreport.com, can track a range of communication applications, such as WhatsApp, Viber, Line, FaceTime, and Skype.
Spy apps allow you to safely monitor not only who they’re talking to, but also the content of their conversation. They also let you review browsing history and shared images, providing you with a sufficient overview of your child’s online activity.
Set privacy settings
Be sure to review the privacy settings of each account your child sets up. Don’t allow them to create a new social media account without you first checking their settings. For example, make sure that their Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok accounts are set to private. This ensures that only people they know and have added can view their content, with nothing being visible to strangers. This helps safeguard them from being targeted by online predators.
You should also double-check that their location, address, and personal information are kept private. If a website features geo-tagging, make sure that this is switched off. Geo-tagging attaches a location to posts, which can make your child’s whereabouts public.
Normally, when you make an online account private, geo-tags and location metadata will be removed from posts - but not all the time. You must review how much turning an account ‘private’ actually conceals and make adjustments as necessary.
Set parental controls
Parental controls allow you to filter out results that you don’t want your child to encounter when using a search engine. Although not 100% reliable, they mitigate the risk of your child coming across explicit or otherwise inappropriate websites, videos, photos, and other forms of media.
Google’s SafeSearch Filters are a good place to start and a good way of guaranteeing that no sexual or violent content is shown in Google search results.
Google’s Family Link also allows you to monitor your child’s online activity remotely. The Family Link app allows you to add your children’s individual Google accounts to monitor browsing history as well as block individual websites.
Limit screen time
Limiting your child’s screen team keeps them safe in the sense that it benefits their overall health and well-being. Currently, around 41% of US teens have a screen time of over eight hours, which is considered highly excessive.
Excessive screen time has regularly been linked to several mental and physical health concerns, such as depression and obesity. It can also prohibit children from getting a healthy amount of sleep at night and also impact their interpersonal skills.
Screen time limits can be set to prevent your children from spending an excessive amount of time on their phones and tablets. Once a limit is set, the phone will prevent your child from accessing social media and other applications after a certain time threshold has been crossed.
As a general rule, the recommended screen time of a two to five-year-old is one hour. The recommended screen time for anyone above the age of six is two hours. These limits are only a suggestion - make your own mind up based on how long you think your child should be spending online per day.
Set safe passwords for them
You must teach your children the basics of how to keep safe online. This starts with teaching them how to set strong passwords that cannot be guessed by cybercriminals. For example, they should not opt for ‘12345678’ or something similarly obvious.
Strong passwords include at least 16 characters and feature a complex selection of letters, numbers, and symbols. Ideally, your passwords should not feature a word but rather digits and letters in a random order.
You could keep a log book of all your child’s passwords or keep them saved in a password manager. You must stress the danger of sharing passwords with other people, even if they’re family or friends.
Teach them what they should and shouldn’t post online
Having an open conversation with your child about the dangers of social media will prevent them from posting inappropriately. This relates to both what they post publically and what they send to people via messenger apps.
Depending on the age of your child, simply adding them as a friend on social media could be enough to keep them safe online. It’ll allow you to monitor the kind of content they post and the type of posts they interact most with. By being a social media friend, you can also keep an eye out for any strangers attempting to contact them.
Having a parent as a friend also teaches children to be more accountable for what they post online. They’re less likely to post inappropriate things or use profanities.
Have strong a strong cyber security set-up
There’s only so much that a strong password can protect your child from. You must also have sophisticated cybersecurity software in place to protect your children from cyber threats.
McAfee, Avast, and Norton all provide sufficient protection against modern cyber threats. Such software can identify and remove malware and other forms of malicious software. They also encrypt data so that personal information is protected from any potential threat.
These software types can also analyze your computer system and identify any potential weaknesses and vulnerabilities. Once identified, these weak spots can be resolved to prevent cyber criminals from using them to their advantage.
By setting up a robust cybersecurity system, your children will be able to use the internet more safely. Plus, the rest of your family’s social media, bank accounts, email addresses, and crypto casino accounts will also all be protected.
Final thoughts
The internet is going to play a huge role in the lives of children from here on out, so we must take the steps necessary to maintain their digital safety. Monitoring online activity and setting parental controls is a good way to prevent them from accessing inappropriate content. Additionally, the likes of setting safe passwords and maintaining strong cyber security will safeguard them from major cyber threats.
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