"Keeping Kids Safe"
  12/01/1999

It's been a long time since email for my children has crossed over into my several email boxes, so naturally when I saw the subject header of "Invitation to join fun4kids" on one of my emails, I knew someone sent it to me by mistake. Always the curious, and yes, overprotective father, I opened and read it. Below, complete with spelling errors, poor grammar and punctuation, is the letter I read:

*****************

Hello,

I would like to invite you to join the fun4kids community.

The description of this community is:

NO ADULTS ALLOWED. You must be 13 or younger to become member of this club.

This list is from kids for kids.

This list is here to make it posible for kids to publish their stories, poems and drawings. Every child can post what ever it wants, also photos, if you wish.

THIS LIST IS ONLY FOR PRETEEN-KIDS UP TO THE AGE OF 13 YEARS. Please do not try do subscribe if you have no public-profile, or if your age is not in that profile or if you are older then 13. I check your age, so if you are too old, or if you age is not in your profile, you will be denied. NO ADULTS ARE ALLOWED. Your sex does not matter. Both, girls and boys are wellcome.

The only condition to join this group is to be a pre-teen child (up to 13 years).

This List is NOT MODERATED. Whatever you send to the list will go into the mailboxes of all members of this list.

There are no rules. Everything is allowed. Only adults are not allowed here

*****************

Once I read the letter, red flags went up in my mind's eye. Several of them. "This list is only for pre-teen kids up to the age of 13 years." That was biggest, brightest red flag standing there, but others, including, "There are no rules. Everything is allowed. Only adults are not allowed here." Talk about being excluded from a private club? That shot another red flag for me. I'm not allowed to see what's going into my children's email? Wrong!

I went back and re-read the email and clicked on the link to go to the Internet site to check out this "for kids only club." The website address, or URL, whichever you prefer to call it, did not go to the fun4kids club. In fact, a search of the entire site where it was supposed to have been hosted at did not turn up anything showing fun4kids, though other things for teenagers and younger children were found.

Thinking about this email got me curious, as well as slightly worried that this may become the new wave of Spam email hitting the Internet. A quick check with my local police department turned up nothing. Got transferred to the detectives. They hadn't heard about the email yet, but "what else is new," was the general response. "Let us check with the FBI to see if they've gotten wind of this yet."

Before the detective had time to hang up his phone, flip the desktop phone caddy to F, flip through the tattered cards to FBI, and dial the number, I was already on the line with Ross Rice, Public Information Officer with the FBI's Chicago Field Office.
Rice said there are a number of issues of concern with children and the Internet, chief among them pedophiles. 

"Adults posing as children," Rice said, "have attempted and successfully begun relationships with minors. Many of those relationships have become sexual. Another area of concern is adults who are buying and selling child pornography on the Internet. This is the main haven for pedophiles - they use the Internet to buy, sell, and trade it."

OK, Agent Rice, I agree with you fully on these points, but does that mean the Internet, in and of itself, is inherently bad?

"No. Absolutely not," Rice quickly interjected. "The Internet itself is not a bad thing at all. It's just that some people are using it for illegal purposes."

Rice said when information is passed to the FBI about illegal activities on the Internet, the FBI will investigate, whether the information comes from the public or another law enforcement agency. Then the information is passed along to the U.S. Dept. of Justice for prosecution.

Rice offered some advice for protecting children while they are on the Internet. Most of it should be commonsense.  "The most important thing for parents to remember", Rice said, "is you have to monitor your child's Internet activities."

• Limit children's time on the Internet.
  

• Don't allow computers in a child's room with Internet access.
  

• Children are vulnerable anywhere there is adult activity. The Internet is no different. Children are naïve on the Net or off.
  

• Pedophiles may be rejected 10 or 20 times in looking for a child who is open to their solicitations. They don't give up. They will go on looking for that one child who will go on with them.

In addition to the information presented by Rice, the FBI's website has pointers for parents, including The Parent's Guide to the Internet. Also available on the site are the phone numbers for the various FBI field offices located throughout the U.S.

While researching this column, I came across to pointers for online activities that seem to be safe for kids, though I can't reassure you of that. As parents, you must be responsible for your child's activities on the net.  One place I found is the CyberSafeKids, posted to misc.kids.computer newsgroup by Teresa Prato (kittyhawk@sympatico.ca) on Nov. 9. 

In her posting, Teresa said, "The online world is no longer optional for our children. It has become (an) increasingly essential component of all our lives, and our children will be the primary beneficiaries of the vast resources it has to offer." I can't agree with Teresa more. She said some of the benefits of CyberSafeKids is that it's accessible to all children, that it has filtered search engines and child-safe links, a secure chatroom (which Teresa says puts this site above any others for children), newsletter, and penpal service. "This site promotes Online Cyber Sense! and teaches children how to use this new frontier to their benefit," Teresa wrote.

The other site I found was listed in the misc.kids.consumers newsgroup under the heading, "new website for creative kids." It touts the benefits that www.pacificsewing.com, basically a gated community, which is open to children endeared to the art of sewing. It was designed to help tech children how to sew and is listed as a terrific place for parents who need access to a resource while helps them do that.

  - by Dave Jackson (Scoop0901)