How do you keep your kids safe online?

Great article. I would just add that it is very important to start online safety at an early age. Many children as young as preschoolers are using tablets and computers for standardized testing; parents give their personal phones/tablets to their children to use for entertainment, etc. It is important to utilize app restrictions, age restrictions, web filtering, time limits and keep a close physical eye on them. Take YouTube as an example; it is a wonderful platform full of very educational materials; something as simple as watching your favorite cartoon character can eventually lead to videos that are not age appropriate due to auto-playing and user created materials.

As someone who does not have children yet, I know that my thoughts on the topic will likely evolve over time, but here is my current opinion.

I completely agree with all points in this article. Kids today do not truly understand the impact their online presence can have on their lives. One wrong click or a bad message can have negative effects on their future career or education goals. I think that the best thing for parents to do is to stay in contact with your kids and have open discussions when possible. Monitoring tools are good, but you must still allow them some sort of freedom to make their own choices. At the end of the day how someone chooses to protect their kids from the dangers of the world is their own choice, but I believe providing them with training and knowledge is the best tool that you can give them to remain safe on the web. Todays kids are more tech savvy than most of their parents and I believe that this will only become more true as time progresses. At the end of the day breaches can happen to any of us. Articles like this one are great to share with kids as well as adults. We all need to remain aware of these threats and act accordingly.

I look forward to reading the thoughts of others and learning from their experiences and suggestions.

As a retired Instructional Technology teacher at the elementary level, this question is near and dear to my heart and I'm thrilled that it is being considered by Thought Leaders in the industry. Unfortunately, the burden of providing instruction for students about their digital footprint and online safety is having to fall on teachers whose instruction plate is already full to over flowing and many of whom do not fully understand online safety themselves. Teachers have tools to monitor student safety when using devices at school for educational purposes but students need to understand the power of being online, not just follow the rules. It is unreasonable to expect teachers to master the ever changing landscape of cyber-security and pass it along to their students in a meaningful way so it is essential that every parent take the time to monitor their child's online activities and explicitly talk with them about safety.

My sons are grown and out of the house, and I retired a year ago after 30 years (I was teaching technology in the days of Fetch and Gopher) but my #1 suggestion is SUPERVISION. I have always advocated for technology to be used "in the open" and never allowed my sons to have a computer, tablet, cell phone, etc. in their bedroom, unsupervised, behind closed doors. Screens were always positioned to face into the room, so that I could see what was going on at a glance, and cell phones could only be used with the bedroom door open. I also became very stealthy at just appearing in the room when my sons were using technology. Now, I'm not naive enough to think that this solved all the problems and kept them 100% safe, because I know it did not. However, when situations did arise, I had a frank and detailed conversation with them about their digital footprint and digital citizenship.

Being a digital native, as this generation is, doesn't mean they understand it's impact any better than their grandparents do. In fact, maybe less so because they just take it for granted. So it becomes much more important to spend quality time educating them on it's use before just turning it over to them unsupervised.

One of the resources that I used extensively in my classroom, and highlighted to parents is CommonSenseMedia.org. This organization give tools for students and parents, not only related to teaching kids to be safe online but also about the content of books, movies, games, etc. that kids are exposed to and parents know nothing about.

Thank you for giving me a minute to get on my soapbox and for addressing this important topic.

Like others here, I believe having frank discussions with your kids and explaining to them the dangers of being online, is crucial. We also severely limited screen time for them until age 13 (no phones or PCs of their own.) They did have tablets that were heavily locked down which they used primarily for games, educational and otherwise. They didn't have social media accounts until they got their phones. We limited screen-time to 1 hour/day.

Now, both of my kids (17 & 14) are very responsible with their phones (their primary device for being online). We know their pins so that we can access their phones at any time. They don't have anything to hide. We are lucky to have a good, open, honest relationships with them. They're probably are on them more than they should be, but they are very good students, regularly participate in sports and other extra-curricular school activities (school play, math club, BLIND, etc). They also have active social live that take place beyond the scope of their phones. They aren't glued to them 24/7. I suppose if they started having trouble at school or encountered instances where their phones were getting them into trouble, we'd have to reconsider our approach.

We just try to be very honest with them and try to instill in them how important it is to be careful online, particularly what they post. I would hate for them to deprive themselves of a future opportunity simply because of something they posted, maybe in haste or reacting to another. I tell them to count to ten before reacting to anything online, or just put the phone down and walk away, if things get a little too tense. My younger son is a gamer with a new PC, but he knows that he cannot go online until all homework/chores are done. He is limited to 2 hours a day of gaming, but he doesn't play daily. He's kind of old-school as he spends a lot of time outdoors biking, skateboarding, jumping on the trampoline, etc. like we did when we were kids. I guess that a good balance is key when it comes to your kids being online. Too much of anything can be bad.

Then there's the technical side of things. Besides a good AV, we also use OpenDNS's Family Shield, which blocks all of the crap you wouldn't want your kids seeing. It's free and customizable. I use this at the router level, so all devices on our network go through the DNS filter. I also encourage my kids to use strong, individual passwords and to use 2FA whenever possible. We've also taught them to be suspicious of anything that sounds too good to be true and approach all email with suspision. I think we're doing a pretty good job. Our kids are savvy users who understand that it's important to employ a cautious approach to being online and that it there responsibility to maintain positive, safe, and beneficial routines when online, for their own good.

My best advice would be to be involved in your kids lives and foster honest, caring relationships with them. Take an interest in what they are doing online and off. My kids know that they can tell me anything and I hope that they will always feel that way.

That article has some very good points. Thanks for posting it.
I also do this training for most of our clients as well and people walk out scared of the internet, which is good! It makes them understand that sitting in a dark room with the door locked does not mean they are safe or in private.
I tell people the only safe PC is the one Unplugged. What can I say....🆓

I completely agree with the article. You can't discuss internet and general safety enough with your kids. I had an experience with my daughter that I never thought would happen. I also had an experience with my son that I never thought would happen. I was on top of it and tough love taught them a very valuable lesson.

Kids and adults need to be reminded on a regular basis about internet safety, which is why I push the Webroot internet security training!

My kids (both teens) haven't been an issue online. The oldest doesn't venture too far from Netflix and Youtube. Email is barely used and she comes to me for help when she needs it. Last time was something along the line of "I got an email saying my Paypal account needs verified." I asked if she had Paypal and she said no. I explained the scan to her and she's been smart about it since.
My youngest games and does a little more online than her sister but hasn't ventured too far. Once, she came home from school and asked me about something she heard at school involving a couple girls and a cup and we had a conversation. Thankfully, she asks first if she's not sure and takes my advice to stay away from things. Her passwords are mighty, unshared, and changes with some frequency.
My kids basically know, that EVERYTHING imaginable is online somewhere and it's forever. They're being careful where they go and what they post.
Growing up with it from day 1 has helped. Their mom got online later than most and has had a harder time recognizing scams and realizing a couple wrong clicks or posting too much information can go wrong quick.

Never be online away from parents. Remind them that posting anything online is like writing with permanent ink.

This is a great article. It is scary what people will do on the internet.

Well my kiddo hasnt gotten to the age of being online. I made sure Parental Controls were enabled or a "Kids Mode" app is installed so that way My kid can only get to what we allow.

I really like to see articles like this, online safety for children is a big concern for us parents. Kudos for doing good work.

I don't have kids, so I can't really participate fully. However, education is the key here, the more they know the better they are at preventing it from happening.

Great article. My daughter is still young (7 will be 8 shortly) so teaching her about internet safety is an ongoing priority. I gave her an old phone that she uses under supervision and she only to play games as of now. She gets to use the desktop pc as well for educational purposes again with supervision. That way as things come up like phishing scams and other assorted internet issues arise I can teach her how to handle them. A big issue was teaching her how to discern ads in games and not click on them. Be it the banner ads or the pop-up ads or the video ads that are all to common in mobile games just so you can continue playing. Now, she has the patience to wait for the little "X" to show up so she can safely close the ad without navigating someplace else. But, I need to be vigilant and continue to teach her to be vigilant about internet security.