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Warning Signs - Your Child Might Be At Risk On-line?
From the Federal Bureau of Investigation
National Center for Missing & Exploited Children
Your child spends large amounts of time on-line, especially at night.
Most children that fall victim to computer-sex offenders spend large amounts of time
on-line, particularly in chat rooms. They may go on-line after dinner and on the
weekends. They may be latchkey kids whose parents have told them to stay at home after
school. They go on-line to chat with friends, make new friends, pass time, and sometimes
look for sexually explicit information. While much of the knowledge and experience gained
may be valuable, parents should consider monitoring the amount of time spent on-line.
Children that are on-line are at the greatest risk during the evening hours. While
offenders are on-line around the clock, most work during the day and spend their
evenings on-line trying to locate and lure children or seek pornography.
You find pornography on your child's computer.
Pornography is often used in the sexual victimization of children. Sex offenders often
supply their potential victims with pornography as a means of opening sexual discussions
and for seduction. Child pornography may be used to show the child victim that sex between
children and adults is "normal." Parents should be conscious of the fact that a child may
hide the pornographic files on diskettes from them. This may be especially true if other
family members use the computer.
Your child receives phone calls from men that you don't know or your child is making
calls, sometimes long distance, to numbers you don't recognize.
While talking to a child victim on-line is a thrill for a computer-sex offender, it can
be very cumbersome. Most want to talk to the children on the telephone. They often
engage in "phone sex" with the children and often seek to set up an actual meeting for
real sex.
While a child may be hesitant to give out his/her home phone number, the computer-sex
offenders will give out theirs. With Caller ID, they can readily find out the child's
phone number. Some computer-sex offenders have even obtained toll-free 800 numbers, so
that their potential victims can call them without their parents finding out. Others
will tell the child to call collect. Both of these methods result in the computer-sex
offender being able to find out the child's phone number.
Your child receives mail, gifts, or packages from someone you don't know.
As part of the seduction process, it is common for offenders to send letters,
photographs, and all manners of gifts to their potential victims. Computer-sex
offenders have even sent plane tickets in order for the child to travel across the
country to meet them.
Your child turns the computer monitor off or quickly changes the screen on the monitor
when you come into the room.
A child looking at pornographic images or having sexually explicit conversations does
not want you to see it on the screen.
Your child becomes withdrawn from the family.
Computer-sex offenders will work very hard at driving a wedge between a child and their
family or at exploiting their relationship. They will accentuate any minor problems at
home that the child might have. Children may also become withdrawn after sexual
victimization.
Your child is using an on-line account belonging to someone else.
Even if you don't subscribe to an on-line service or Internet service, your child may
meet an offender while on-line at a friend's house or the library. Most computers come
preloaded with on-line and/or Internet software. Computer-sex offenders will sometimes
provide potential victims with a computer account for communications with them.
What Should you do if You Suspect Your Child is Communicating With A Sexual Predator On-line?
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.
Should any of the following situations arise in your household, via the Internet or
on-line service, you should immediately contact your local or state law enforcement agency,
the FBI, and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
- Your child or anyone in the household has received child pornography.
- Your child has been sexually solicited by someone who knows that your child is under 18
years old.
- Your child has received sexually explicit images from someone that knows your child is
under the age of 18.
If one of these scenarios occurs, keep the computer turned off in order to preserve any
evidence for future law enforcement use. Unless directed to do so by the law enforcement
agency, you should not attempt to copy any of the images and/or text found on the computer.
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 is a great place for children to make new friends, and discuss
various topics of interest, computer-sex offenders also prowl chat rooms. 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.
Learn 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 s/he 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.
Frequently Asked Questions:
My child has received an e-mail advertising for a pornographic website, what should I do?
Generally, advertising for an adult, pornographic website that is sent to an e-mail
address does not violate federal law or the current laws of most states. In some
states it may be a violation of law if the sender knows the recipient is under the
age of 18. Such advertising can be reported to your service provider and, if known,
the service provider of the originator. It can also be reported to your state and
federal legislators, so they can be made aware of the extent of the problem.
Are any Internet services safer than the others?
Sex offenders have contacted children via most of the major on-line services and
the Internet. The most important factors in keeping your child safe on-line are
the utilization of appropriate blocking software and/or parental controls, along
with open, honest discussions with your child, monitoring his/her on-line activity,
and following the tips in this pamphlet.
Should I just forbid my child from going on-line?
There are dangers in every part of our society. By educating your children to
these dangers and taking appropriate steps to protect them, they can benefit
from the wealth of information now available on-line.
Helpful Definitions:
- Internet - An immense, global network that connects computers via telephone lines
and/or fiber networks to storehouses of electronic information. With only a computer,
a modem, a telephone line and a service provider people from all over the world can
communicate and share information with little more than a few keystrokes.
- Bulletin Board Systems (BBSs) - Electronic networks of computers that are connected
by a central computer setup and operated by a system administrator or operator and
are distinguishable from the Internet by their "dial-up" accessibility. BBS users
link their individual computers to the central BBS computer by a modem that allows
them to post messages, read messages left by others, trade information, or hold
direct conversations. Access to a BBS can, and often is, privileged and limited
to those users who have access privileges granted by the systems operator.
- Commercial On-line Service (COS) - Examples of COSs are America Online, Prodigy,
CompuServe and Microsoft Network, which provide access to their service for a fee.
COSs generally offer limited access to the Internet as part of their total service
package.
- Internet Service Provider (ISP) - Examples of ISPs are Erols, Concentric and Netcom.
These services offer direct, full access to the Internet at a flat, monthly rate and
often provide electronic-mail service for their customers. ISPs often provide space
on their servers for their customers to maintain World Wide Web (WWW) sites. Not all
ISPs are commercial enterprises. Educational, governmental and nonprofit organizations
also provide Internet access to their members.
- Public Chat Rooms - Created, maintained, listed and monitored by the COS and other
public domain systems such as Internet Relay Chat. A number of customers can be in
the public chat rooms at any given time, which are monitored for illegal activity
and even appropriate language by systems operators (SYSOP). Some public chat rooms
are monitored more frequently than others, depending on the COS and type of chat room.
Violators can be reported to the administrators of the system (at America On-line they
are referred to as terms of service [TOS]) which can revoke user privileges. The public
chat rooms usually cover a broad range of topics such as entertainment, sports, game
rooms, children-only, etc.
- Electronic Mail (E-Mail) - A function of BBSs, COSs and ISPs which provides
for the transmission of messages and files between computers over a communications
network similar to mailing a letter via the postal service. E-mail is stored on
a server, where it will remain until the addressee retrieves it. The sender can maintain
anonymity by predetermining what the receiver will see as the "from" address.
Another way to conceal one's identity is to use an "anonymous remailer," which is a
service that allows the user to send an e-mail message repackaged under the remailer's
own header, stripping off the originator's name completely.
- Chat - Real-time text conversation between users in a chat room with no expectation of privacy. All chat conversation is accessible by all individuals in the chat room while the conversation is taking place.
- Instant Messages - Private, real-time text conversation between two users
in a chat room.
- Internet Relay Chat (IRC) - Real-time text conversation similar to public
and/or private chat rooms on COS.
- Usenet (Newsgroups) - Like a giant, cork bulletin board where users post
messages and information. Each posting is like an open letter and is
capable of having attachments, such as graphic image files (GIFs). Anyone
accessing the newsgroup can read the postings, take copies of posted items,
or post responses. Each newsgroup can hold thousands of postings. Currently,
there are over 29,000 public newsgroups and that number is growing daily.
Newsgroups are both public and/or private. There is no listing of private
newsgroups. A user of private newsgroups has to be invited into the newsgroup
and be provided with the newsgroup's address.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Office of Crimes Against Children
935 Pennsylvania Ave, NW Room 4127
Washington, D.C. 20535
Telephone (202) 324-3666
National Center for Missing & Exploited Children
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