/ Is it safe for my child to have a MySpace profile?

Is it safe for my child to have a MySpace profile?

Celeste Stewart While I understand the allure of MySpace, as a parent, I’m extremely concerned about social networking websites. My children aren’t old enough just yet to want a MySpace profile but I know that it won’t be long.

One of the common concerns that parents have with sites such as MySpace involves predators. Who’s looking at your child’s profile? What if they like what they see? What if they can find out where your child lives or goes to school? What if they can find out where your child hangs out after school?

This is a common concern and one that shouldn’t be taken lightly. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to look at information and come to conclusions. For example, if your child uses a screen name of “No1CardinalFan” and customizes his MySpace profile with “Go Arizona Cardinals!” one might make an assumption that your child lives in Arizona. Next, let’s suppose that your child posts that he is at the top of his class at Mesa High School. Could he live in Mesa, Arizona perhaps? Could a predator then look up the local newspaper and find a list of school awards, thereby figuring out your child’s name?

Scary, isn’t it?

Sure, you can teach your child not to reveal too much information but can you really be sure? What about the comments left by your child’s friends? Imagine that one of your child’s friends places a comment that says, “Meet me at Burger Hut tomorrow after school.” The predator already knows that your child lives in Mesa, Arizona - now he knows where and when to find him.

I joined MySpace about a year ago to see what the big fuss was all about. Honestly, I was terribly impressed. There’s no real age verification making it easy for kids to create their own profile without any sort of restriction. While I was experimenting with creating a profile, I suddenly found myself with several “friend” requests - most involving webcams and promises of scantily-clad adventures. Who’s sending friend requests to your child?

I won’t be allowing my children to set up MySpace and other Social Networking profiles though by the time they are old enough, there will be other, equally disturbing, Web sites and dangers out there.

However, I’m not naïve. I may say “no” to MySpace but my kids may find a way to do it anyway. That’s why, even now as they are just getting comfortable with the Internet, we discuss the dangers of the Internet and how some people might pretend to be other than they really are. Education is the first step. These dialogues should be ongoing.

The second step is to keep an eye on what your child is doing online. While it may seem like the modern equivalent of snooping through your child’s diary, using software to restrict and monitor online activities is a necessary evil. Use parental control software to block access to sites such as MySpace and follow up by using monitoring software to see exactly what your child is up to.