2008-05-09
B.C. child prostitutes advertising themselves online
Five girls in the care of the B.C. children's ministry have been selling sex on Craigslist, police say. Police said the girls, aged 16 and 17, have been offering their services on the U.S.-based advertising website's "erotic services" section for the Greater Vancouver area.
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2008-05-08
Dive in to Hector's World!
Children as young as five years old are the focus of a new online safety programme being launched today, Thursday 8th May 2008, by the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) Centre.
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2008-05-08
123 Illinois sex offenders from MySpace discovered on Facebook
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan announced today that Facebook has agreed to make key changes to its social networking site that will better protect children from predators and inappropriate content.
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2008-05-08
Facebook agrees to protect young customers
Following MySpace out of the penalty box of 50 state attorneys general, the social network Facebook is agreeing to a broad set of principles to protect young users from predators and inappropriate material.
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2008-05-08
From 14 to 16: What does raising the age of consent accomplish?
The Criminal Code of Canada was amended last week to raise the age of consent to 16 from 14. Here is a dissenting opinion, well worth a read whether you agree with its conclusions or not.
Read the opinion
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2008-05-08
New bill: No ID, no 'mature' video games for you
A new bill in the U.S. Congress would force retailers to card kids attempting to buy video games bearing "mature" or "adults only" ratings. Saving kids from themselves, or just more ill-informed politicians jumping on an issue du jour?
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2008-05-08
Cartoon policeman and dolphin to warn children about online pedophiles
Child abuse experts are targeting children as young as five for the first time to teach them about the dangers of online pedophiles.
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2008-05-08
McNamara tackles technology with 'cyberbully' bill
With the advent of text messaging, instant messaging and social networking Web sites like Facebook or MySpace, student codes of conduct are being reworked to extend beyond school walls and into the vast world of technology.
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2008-05-07
New positions aimed to protect children online
The U.S. Justice Department is vowing to target Internet users who prey on children. The agency is announcing the creation of 43 new positions for prosecutors aimed at protecting young people from online sexual predators.
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2008-05-07
Ban 'Second Life' in schools and libraries, Republican congressman says
A Republican congressman who has sponsored legislation banning access to social-networking Web sites in schools and libraries has found a new target of displeasure: Second Life.
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2008-05-07
Call for joint effort to combat online child pornography
The fight against child abuse over the Internet is often hampered by data protection rules, but a joint effort between privacy authorities, financial institutions and Internet services providers can ensure significant results in line with national laws, according to a new report.
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2008-05-06
Earn money protecting children online with WiHood's "virtual laptop" service
WiHood's "virtual laptop" service can now earn parents and organizations money while protecting children online and bridging the digital divide.
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2008-05-06
Byron sets boundaries
A new report commissioned by the government pulls out all the stops in tackling internet and gaming safety for children. But will action follow, asks Julie Nightingale.
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2008-05-06
EU, children's rights group appeals to banks, Internet companies to help fight child porn
Banks, credit card companies and Internet service providers were pushed Tuesday to help hunt those who sexually exploit children online or buy images of abuse. Child pornography has become a multibillion dollar industry, a children's rights group said.
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2008-05-06
Dinosaur Junction's new online children's game
Dinosaur Junction announced today the opening for subscriptions of their child safe, online, interactive prehistoric game.
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2008-05-06
Anti-bullying law gives grieving mom hope
Jeffrey Johnston was a "techno geek," a straight-A student and a vegetarian -- a teenager who loved computers, animals and his large family. He also was a victim of bullying (both in real life and the cyber version) that started in seventh grade and continued, on and off, for more than two years.
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2008-05-06
Study shows children's web sites may be entertaining, but may also make kids cry
Publishers of many major children's Web sites should do a better job disclosing sales and advertising information to parents, especially as more kids at younger ages go online to play and meet friends, says a study released today.
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2008-05-05
Cyberbullying seminar this week
The School District of Palm Beach County's department of Safe Schools will be holding a summit to prevent cyberbullying. This week's summit will focus on the basics of cyber-bullying as well as raise awareness.
Read the announcement
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2008-05-05
School's responsibility in cyberbullying
Cyberbullying continues to make headlines as more and more children come forward to report online harassment. But the law is still playing catchup with new problems caused by technology.
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2008-05-04
Online safety, a necessity for children
While the Internet continues to be a rapidly expanding resource, usage also comes with a great deal of risk and danger for vulnerable children.
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2008-04-24
Montana cops working to nab online predators
Detectives in Montana say that child sexual exploitation is exploding and as part of our special series, Montana's News Station takes an in depth look at what police are doing statewide and locally to stop Internet predators.
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2008-04-24
Teachers told to protect children from online risks
Leading internet and telecoms firms have teamed up with the European Commission in the fight against cyber-bullying by launching a new website showing teachers how to spot inappropriate use of the Internet and mobile phones by children.
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2008-04-24
Schools must address threats made online
The popularity of Internet sites such as MySpace has made cyberbullying a real problem among young people. It also has made it a real headache for school districts, since such messages are generally created after school hours and on computers located off campus. Even so, school districts have a responsibility to protect students and staff...
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2008-04-23
Facebook accused of promoting online bullying
Facebook has been accused of encouraging online bullying by allowing users to post anonymous comments about other members of the site.
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2008-04-23
WiHood, world’s first “virtual laptop” that protects children online
WiHood’s “virtual laptop” on a USB bracelet protects children online when the parents are not home, or when the children are surfing at a friend’s home, or at school, or on vacation.
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2008-04-23
Police to question chatroom girl
A 10-year-old British girl who left obscene messages on an internet chatroom is to be questioned by police. Devon and Cornwall Police were contacted by the girl's parents after she admitted pretending to be a male pedophile looking for local children.
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2008-04-23
New forum for online child predators
Wherever it may be, children are finding a way online. The more children logging onto the internet, the more predators are too and they’re chatting with kids on the most unsuspecting websites: video game websites.
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2008-04-22
Sick images spark porn law call
A judge has called for the reform of child pornography laws after jailing a man for possessing more than 35,000 images of "the most disturbing and depraved kind", including the torture and abuse of babies and bestiality.
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2008-04-22
Children recruited by terrorists on friends websites
Parents have been warned by police that terrorists could be recruiting children through social networking websites.
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2008-04-22
Rise in child-sex arrests
The number of child sex offenders arrested in the UK has trebled over the last year, according to the organisation set up by that country to deal with the problem.
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2008-04-22
Digital kids challenge parents & teachers to be savvy & engaged
As if parenting in the real world wasn’t hard enough, millions of unsuspecting mums and dads now need to learn how to function in virtual worlds if they want to know who their kids are hanging out with.
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2008-04-21
Child porn check - Government cracking down on sex-video wave in Jamaica
The Jamaican Government is now aggressively moving to arrest child pornography in the wake of a wave of electronic circulation of sexually explicit material.
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2008-04-21
Rise in child-sex arrests
The number of child sex offenders arrested has trebled over the last year, according to the organisation set up to deal with the problem. Almost 300 suspects have been detained in the last 12 months by officers from the Child Exploitation and Online Protection (CEOP) Centre.
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2008-04-21
Hunting the Internet predators
A profile of Ceop: "In the heart of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection centre, or Ceop, is a small windowless room - the victim identification suite..."
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2008-04-21
New child protection measures on social networking websites
Providing links on social networking websites to protection agencies - including the police, NSPCC and the Samaritans - is one of a range of recommendations for industry and users in new guidance launched today by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.
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2008-04-21
Crackdown on net abusers - but what's behind the numbers?
Blog post: Should we demand more accurate figures from Britain's hi-tech anti-paedophile squad?
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2008-04-17
Fewer than 3,000 websites produce bulk of child porn
Fewer than 3,000 English-language websites produce the bulk of child pornography images, according to the first authoritative analysis of the scale of the problem, published today.
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2008-04-17
Teachers becoming latest targets of cyberbullying
"She was an assistant principal at a Boston-area high school three years ago when she discovered a MySpace.com page under her name - carrying her photograph and a series of disturbing messages from students. "One said, `I want to kill her,' " said the woman."
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2008-04-16
College gets online protection
A South African college has implemented Aladdin's eSafe Web content filtering solution, supplied and supported in SA by Magix Integration. According to Magix Integration, eSafe allows the students and staff free access to the Internet, while ensuring they are protected from unsavoury and unsafe elements on the Web.
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2008-04-16
Kids don't protect online privacy: survey
Don't talk to strangers. That's some traditional advice parents give their kids. But youngsters are not always heeding the warning when going online. A new national study conducted by Kids Help Phone indicates many are giving out personal details to people they've never met.
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2008-04-16
Madison school deals with cyberbullying
A school beating that was recorded and posted on YouTube has prompted Madison County Schools officials to investigate who is responsible for the recording. Students and a national anti-violence group say such recordings, which are considered "cyberbullying," have become commonplace in the digital era.
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2008-04-16
Cyberbullying with new technologies: how teachers should respond
A teacher's perspective: "Fighting this new form of bullying isn't just a technical problem, says Dr Denise Carter. We need to educate children to anticipate risks and become emotionally resilient."
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2008-04-16
Senator: Let's monitor P2P for illegal files
A prominent Senate Democrat on Wednesday said federal and local police should use custom software to monitor peer-to-peer networks for illegal activity, and wants to spend $1 billion in tax dollars to make that happen.
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2008-04-16
Authorities: Internet sites used in child prostitution rings
A federal grand jury in Detroit has returned indictments charging five people in connection with Internet child prostitution rings.
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2008-04-15
Limited funds hinder child porn fight
More than 624,000 computers in the USA have traded child pornography, much of it showing the sexual abuse of very young children, in the past 2½ years, a leading police authority planned to tell Congress at a hearing Wednesday. Yet federal authorities with limited resources pursue fewer than 1% of the leads.
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2008-04-15
Software tracks child porn traffickers online
Police investigator Flint Waters types "toddler" on his laptop keyboard, and in the time it takes to read this paragraph, up pop dozens of pictures and videos that show young children being sexually molested.
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2008-04-15
Vermont invests to knock down online predators
As digital technology evolves, so do the schemes of would-be assailants lurking in cyberspace. State law enforcement officials said Monday that Vermont teenagers are increasingly vulnerable to a criminal element that veils itself behind the anonymity of the virtual world.
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2008-04-15
Becta & ADCS to help councils develop e-safety strategies to protect children
Becta, the UK government's education technology agency, and The Association of Directors of Children's Services (ADCS) are launching a free e-safety training and support scheme for Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs), as part of Becta's drive to help local authorities protect children and learners when they are online.
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2008-04-15
Deal with the dangers of children going online
All parents will teach their children how to cross a road safely or how to deal with stranger danger. Yet despite children spending a huge amount of time on the computer, many parents have never discussed how to use the internet safely with them. Studies suggest that many parents just don't know what their kids are doing online.
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2008-04-14
Sebelius signs bill to prohibit cyberbullying
To ensure a safe and welcoming learning environment for every Kansas child, Governor Kathleen Sebelius has signed a bill to require schools to prohibit cyberbullying.
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2008-04-14
Google tackles child pornography
Google engineers have adapted a software program to help track child sex predators and search for patterns in images of abuse on the web.
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2008-04-14
Beating case shines light on cyberbullying
Fights used to start in the schoolyard. Now, many are starting somewhere else: on the internet. Polk investigators say it seems like that's where a fight seen round the world may have started. They say the teen girl from Mulberry who was beaten on videotape talked trash about her friends on her MySpace page, and they retaliated.
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2008-04-14
Sex attack on Bebo teenage girl
A 13 year-old girl was sexually assaulted by a man after jokingly advertising herself as a 'whore' on the Bebo website, it was claimed last night. Police are investigating whether the girl was targeted by a pervert she may have unwittingly met on the social networking site.
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2008-04-11
School uses student mediators to stop cyberbullying
The whole province should learn from a program that has successfully identified and dampened cyberbullying among students at a primary school in Pointe aux Trembles, Quebec's largest teachers' union said yesterday.
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2008-04-11
Focus on online 'Buddy lists'
If you want to protect your child from Internet predators, all you have to do is follow the old adage, "Be your child's buddy." But that little nugget of pop-psychology has a different connotation in the World Wide Web.
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2008-04-10
If we deny children access to all computer games, we deprive them of a rich and magical experience
"It's true that Grand Theft Auto contains violence and misogyny. So does The Godfather. So, for that matter, does The Iliad." So begins a passionate and astute defence of video games, in the wake of the Byron Review.
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2008-04-10
Pre-teen modeling ... legal child pornography?
"Red carpets. Photo shoots. Makeup artists. Hair extensions. Expensive outfits... pre-teen models dreaming of becoming supermodels are preening for the cameras. But does pre-teen modeling lead to stardom — or exploitation?"
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2008-04-10
Follow these tips to protect children online
Five simple and handy tips. It really can be this simple.
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2008-04-10
With cyber bullying, girls gone wild gets a horrifying new meaning
Victoria Lindsay will never forget the day she was attacked. Footage of the beating, perpetrated and videotaped by girls she thought were friends, is now all over the Internet.
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2008-04-10
Scarborough enters the youth/teen research market with new Internet panel
Scarborough Research announced today that it is expanding its consumer and media research services to include custom studies for youth and teen markets via a new Internet panel. The company has launched the Scarborough Kids Internet Panel, or "SKIP."
Read the press release
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2008-04-10
Teachers sound alarm over cyberbullying
Quebec's teachers are calling on the Charest government to hurry up and release its action plan to help fight cyberbullying, saying it's a growing problem.
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2008-04-09
Closing the net on sex offenders
Displaying reporting links to agencies including the police, NSPCC and the Samaritans on social networking websites is one of a range of recommendations for industry and users in new guidance launched today by the UK Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, alongside new proposals to make it harder for child sex offenders to meet children online.
Read the press release
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2008-04-09
RCMP on P.E.I. seek funding to create child pornography unit
RCMP on Prince Edward Island are looking for money to create a specialized child pornography unit. P.E.I. is the only Canadian province without an Internet Child Exploitation unit, a division in which specially trained officers are able to investigate sexual crimes and abuses against children online.
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2008-04-09
Brazil Senate orders Google to identify website pedophiles
A Brazilian Senate panel ordered Google on Wednesday to give it access to 3,261 profiles containing suspected pedophile material on a highly popular social-networking website.
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2008-04-09
Group calls for teen privacy protections on Facebook, MySpace
The rules that limit Web sites and marketers from collecting data on kids under 13 may spread to teens as old as 18 if a group of child advocates has its way.
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2008-04-09
Press watchdog to probe privacy of online social networking
Newspaper watchdog the Press Complaints Commission is conducting research into public attitudes to privacy in relation to social networking websites. With millions of people now members of online communities such as Facebook, more and more personal information is available to anyone – including journalists – online.
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2008-04-09
Learning about safe surfing
How safe are you online? That was the question students at Harbord Collegiate Institute came out to find the answers to yesterday. Counsellors from Kids Help Phone along with an online safety specialist were on hand to help educate youth about the dangers of giving out information online.
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2008-04-09
Seeking cyberbullying fame
National group says videotaped beating combines the worst of playground and online bullying behavior. Were the teens seeking cyberbullying fame when they posted a videotaped beating of another teen? The National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC) says this latest incident shows the harsh reality of bullying.
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2008-04-08
Keeping your kids safe in cyberspace
It has not been a good few days for the internet: a succession of recent reports and surveys has warned of the dangers the web poses to children, and parents could be forgiven for cancelling their broadband subscriptions and dumping the family computer.
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2008-04-08
Web extra: anti-bullying tips, cyberbullying, Bully video game
There's lots of steps parents can take to keep their kids safe from bullies.
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2008-04-08
Internet safety starts with parent-child communication
Communication is the key to a good relationship with your children, and talking about the Internet is vital to their safety.
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2008-04-08
Internet safety school to home
Several Middle Georgia schools have taken internet safety measures. Today, the faculty at Perry Middle School, is taking it a step further. School leaders are educating parents about online dangers.
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2008-04-08
Lovestruck MySpace teen not guilty of harassment, court says
Interesting case in which a lovestruck 18-year-old is eventually cleared by the New York City court of "aggravated harassment" of a 14-year-old girl on MySpace.
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2008-04-07
Net is playground for parents as well as children
Parents are far more likely to use the internet regularly than adults without children, according to research published today, and what they are doing online varies with the age of their offspring.
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2008-04-07
Bullying moves to the Internet
It's an age-old problem that's taken on a new form in a new age. And it's posing a new challenge for educators. Once limited to face-to-face encounters, bullying has moved to the Internet, where, some say, the insults have become more damaging because the perpetrators can hide behind screen names and online personalities created with the click of a mouse.
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2008-04-07
Measures to protect kids online don't go far enough
While welcoming new governmental recommendations to protect children surfing the web, one of the UK's largest children's charities has warned that the measures may not work. The NSPCC has stated firmly that the Home Office recommendation that those on the child sex offenders' list be forced to hand over their email address to police so that they can be blocked from social networking sites, will have a limited effect.
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2008-04-07
Are your kids safe?
Online safety expert Debbie Gordon says common sense is a parent's best guide when it comes to navigating the complex and sometimes unfamiliar terrain of the Internet.
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2008-04-06
Virginia first state to require Internet safety lessons
Virginia has become the first state to mandate that public schools offer Internet safety classes for all grade levels. Across the United States, Texas and Illinois are among states that have since passed their own Internet safety education laws, but unlike Virginia they don't make the courses mandatory. Other states are considering similar legislation.
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2008-04-06
Cyberbullies: Online attacks affecting teens
When an online bully attacks, it becomes intensely personal. And it's happening here, say area counselors, police and young people. One South Dakota high school senior says harassing e-mails, text messages and a Web site containing attacks disrupted her life for several months.
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2008-04-06
Online 'cyberbullying' hurtful for children
Recent advances in technology have given kids new ways to communicate, but also new ways to be hurt. Bullying from the schoolyard has moved to being harassed by peers online or by cell phone.
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2008-04-04
Sex offenders face website bans
Sex offenders' e-mail addresses are to be passed to social networking sites like Facebook and Bebo to prevent them contacting children. Under government proposals, offenders who do not give police their address - or give a false one - would face up to five years in jail.
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2008-04-04
Internet safety plans 'pointless'
The UK Government has proposed new measures to prevent pedophiles grooming children over the internet. Phil Worms, director of the Glasgow-based internet safety and security company Netintelligence, gives his views on the idea.
Read the opinion
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2008-04-04
UK Government publishes report on protecting kids online
The UK government has today published its recommendations to help protect children as they surf the Internet. The Telegraph leaked one of the recommendations recently - that the 999 emergency details be displayed on all networking sites, but the report by Home Secretary Jacqui Smith actually takes this a step further.
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2008-04-04
D-Link offers online safety tips for children
Following on from the Byron Report, and the government guidelines released today by the Home Office, D-Link has released its own free guide [pdf] for keeping kids safe online.
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2008-04-03
The Internet: how parents can play safe
It has not been a good week for the Internet: a succession of recent reports and surveys has warned of the dangers the web poses to children, and parents could be forgiven for cancelling their broadband subscriptions and throwing the family computer out with the rest of the household waste. However... [some good links in this article]
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2008-04-03
Study: Kids put profiles on older sites
If the Internet at its worst is a lair for child predators, child safety folks have the best of reasons to worry about social networking sites, where members are invited to post all sorts of revealing information about themselves. Now they have even more reason to worry.
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2008-04-03
Virtual nightmares about social networking
"Two UK reports declare children to be in danger when online - yet there's no evidence to support these fears." A well-argued critique of some of the alarmist reactions to recent reports on children's new media behaviours, even if the writer tends to go too far the other way in his attempt to counteract the prevailing wisdom.
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2008-04-03
Home Office calls for better security on social networking sites
Social networking sites should carry the telephone numbers of child welfare agencies, the police and confidential hotlines under guidance to be published tomorrow, aimed at improving online security.
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2008-04-02
Children’s social network pages ‘must have privacy lock’
Two and a half million children aged between 8 and 17 have created profiles on social networking sites, according to research. But parents fail to realise that poor security means that about four in ten personal pages are open for anyone to look at.
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2008-04-02
Adult social networking sites attract young users
Millions of children are using social networking websites intended for older users, according to a study by the media regulator, Ofcom. Research into internet use has found that, among children with internet access, more than a quarter of eight to 11-year-olds claimed to have a profile page on a social networking website. This is despite nominal age restrictions aimed at preventing pre-teens from using such sites.
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2008-04-02
Rejuvenated CyberPatrol will protect kids
CyberPatrol LLC, a new company founded by former executives of PestPatrol, announced Wednesday that it has acquired the well-known CyberPatrol parental control utility from Websense.
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2008-04-02
Online browsing tips for children
The Worldwide Web offers endless educational and entertainment opportunities, especially for children. However, parents must remember that the Internet is also a passage into your home for sexual predators and access to information that may be inappropriate.
Read the tips
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2008-04-02
Search warrants for child porn too slow, say RCMP
Child pornography investigations in Atlantic Canada are being held up by internet service providers who require search warrants before providing customer information, say RCMP.
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2008-04-02
Parents' views on social networks
Some interesting parental reactions to the recent report which shows that more than a quarter of eight to 11-year-olds who are online in the UK have a profile on a social network site. Seems like it's an issue, but media handwringing does not necessarily reflect the actual experiences of real people.
Read the comments
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2008-04-02
Can the UK government regulate US-based social networking sites?
An interesting question, indeed, and a refreshing take on the issues raised by recent reports in the UK.
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2008-04-01
Psychologist says kids sharing secrets online may be OK
Just because your kids aren't telling you their darkest secrets doesn't mean they're not sharing them with someone else online. But that's not always a bad thing, psychologist Linda Young says.
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2008-04-01
Agents target online predators
"She looked like an easy target for an Internet predator. She told her adult “buddy” she was 14 and she lived in the area. After an explicit chat online, they agreed to meet in person. When the man showed up at the meeting place, however, the teenage girl wasn’t there..."
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2008-04-01
Virtual playground
A whole generation of kids is growing up in the internet age. They're web savvy and find a lot of their entertainment online, giving entrepreneurs plenty of opportunities to cater to the kid crowd. But there are important issues these startups need to be aware of.
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2008-04-01
Parents need to use common sense when it comes to their kids and the Internet
Online safety expert Debbie Gordon says common sense is a parent's best guide when it comes to navigating the complex and sometimes unfamiliar terrain of the Internet. Gordon has been speaking to children, parents and teachers about the Internet for the last six years, and says parents are doing a better job with the Internet than when she first started speaking publicly.
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2008-04-01
'Miss Bimbo' online game gets makeover amid criticism
The makers of the online game "Miss Bimbo" have removed the option for players to purchase virtual diet pills as the game targeting young girls comes under close scrutiny.
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2008-04-01
Tech Weekly: Tanya Byron and internet bandwidth
Listen to the podcast discussing Dr. Tanya Byron's report for the UK government on child safety online.
Listen to the podcast
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2008-03-31
Parental advisory
Response to the Byron Report [pdf] has been largely positive. But what is its likely impact - and can regulation of any kind really ever work? It's not often that a government-sponsored review is welcomed warmly by all sides. But that's the odd position that Tanya Byron, the TV psychologist and author of a review into child safety on the internet, found herself in last week.
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2008-03-31
This review builds consensus - now let's act on it
More analysis of the Byron Report.
Read the analysis
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2008-03-30
Cyberbullying a growing concern for parents, schools
With recent high-profiled cases revolving around cyberbullying - sending or receiving threatening messages online or via text message - teens' online interactions are becoming a growing concern for parents and school districts alike.
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2008-03-28
Good old parenting will keep the online bogeymen at bay
It sounds almost too obvious, really, but: the way to keep children safe in the virtual world is to give them the skills that they have always needed in the real world.
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2008-03-27
Parents to be shown how to protect children online
The first national [UK] strategy for child internet safety, including a streamlined system for classifying computer video games and codes of practice for social networking sites, will be set out today in a ground-breaking report for government.
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2008-03-27
Internet savvy children live in techno-Narnia
Alice has moved on. Today's child has access to a world more perplexing than the universe Lewis Carroll's heroine found beneath the rabbit hole. The modern version of the story of a pre-teenager lost in a fantasy realm could be entitled Alice in Cyberspace.
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2008-03-27
Internet and video game safety: Ten practical tips to help protect your children
One of Gordon Brown's first actions on becoming Prime Minister was to commission a review into the potentially harmful effects of the internet and video games on children... Here we offer our top ten practical tips for keeping your children safe online, while playing video games, and even while using their mobile phones.
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2008-03-27
PM backs call to protect children online
British Prime minister Gordon Brown today backed Dr Tanya Byron's proposals for a national strategy for improving child safety online, saying internet service providers had to take more responsibility for what children can access on their computers.
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2008-03-26
Social networking sites must protect children from paedophiles
Facebook and other social networking websites will have to display prominent safety messages under guidelines to protect children from paedophiles and conmen. The Daily Telegraph has learnt that the Home Office will also urge sites such as Bebo and MySpace to encourage young internet users to tighten their privacy settings, in order to prevent strangers gaining access to their personal profile pages.
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2008-03-26
Parents concerned about Miss Bimbo game
Parents' groups have criticised a new internet craze in which young girls give virtual characters plastic surgery and feed them diet pills. The Miss Bimbo game has seen girls aged as young as nine given an online alter ego, which they look after.
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2008-03-25
Google warms up to parents with kids' safety video
Google is making its first public relations play for parents. On Tuesday, the search company will unveil a new Family Safety Guide, a parent's resource for kids' safety online.
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2008-03-25
Warning to parents over children 'being raised online'
British children are spending more than 20 hours a week online, most of it at social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Bebo, and are in effect being "raised online", according to research from the Institute for Public Policy Research.
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2008-03-25
Majority of parents fear their children's safety online
According to research from F-Secure Corp., the majority of parents in both the U.S. and Europe are worried about their children's safety while using the Internet. Only 5.5% believe their children are totally safe, with a further 18% feeling somewhat safe.
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2008-03-24
Parents urged to ban computers from their children's bedrooms
Parents will this week be urged to ban computers from their children's bedrooms. A report by TV psychologist Tanya Byron into the damaging impact of video games and the internet will point out that parents have little idea what their youngsters do online.
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2008-03-22
Laws on child porn inadequate
Japan has been criticized by the international community as a "child pornography powerhouse," but a campaign to legally ban individuals from possessing pornographic images of children is gaining momentum in this country.
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2008-03-21
Learn the online safety rules
Next Tuesday night at Potomac Falls High School in Cascades Loudoun residents will have access to some of the nation's leading experts in the field of Internet safety. It is a forum that all parents who are concerned about their children's online activities should attend with their children.
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2008-03-20
Internet fuels child exploitation
The advent of the World Wide Web has provided child predators a new way to connect with children—and with other abusers. With approximately 20 per cent of all Internet pornography involving children, law enforcement agencies are hard-pressed to respond effectively.
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2008-03-20
Ont. bill to mandate reporting of child porn one step closer to becoming law
Reporting suspected child pornography to police would become mandatory in Ontario under legislation that moved one step closer to becoming law Thursday after it received all-party approval on second reading in the provincial legislature.
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2008-03-20
NI children 'surfing web alone'
Two thirds of children in Northern Ireland are still left unsupervised on the internet, a survey has suggested.
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2008-03-19
iKeepSafe and Symantec host Norton Connected & Protected Kids' Assembly to honor Utah First Lady Mary Kaye Huntsman
Symantec, makers of Norton security software, and the Internet Keep Safe Coalition, a national non-profit organization committed to Internet safety, today honored Utah First Lady Mary Kaye Huntsman with the Internet Keep Safe Award for her efforts towards keeping Salt Lake City's children safe online.
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2008-03-18
Liberal wants Ont. law to require reporting of suspected child pornography
The opposition parties said Tuesday they expect to support a bill by a Liberal backbencher in the Ontario legislature who wants the law changed to make it mandatory for anyone who suspects they've seen child pornography to report it to police.
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2008-03-18
Governor Lynch applauds Senate Committee's vote in support of Online Child Safety Act
New Hampshire Governor John Lynch today thanked the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee for continuing to work with him to protect children from sexual predators by supporting the Online Child Safety Act.
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2008-03-18
Concerns raised over online child safety
Jim Gamble, chief executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, has said that some internet service providers were not doing enough to protect children online.
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2008-03-18
KidZui vets Web for kids
Few Youtube videos are age-appropriate for a toddler or a pre-teen. And even fewer parents will take the time to find that dinosaur-related clip amidst a slew of music and college-partying videos. But a new Web company aims to do the work for parents.
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2008-03-18
Keeping kids safe online: myths & tips
"Kids today live in an interactive “Web 2.0” world, where they socialize, post photographs and videos and share common experiences with friends, friends of friends and, in some cases, strangers. Millions of kids are doing it every day and the overwhelming majority of them seem to be doing just fine. But that doesn’t mean that the social-Web is a danger-free zone..."
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2008-03-17
Police investigating child pornography ring arrest 18 Western Australian men
Police in Western Australia have arrested 18 men in connection with a world-wide investigation into child pornography.
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2008-03-15
Parents learn to keep kids Internet safe
"Some parents wouldn’t know a chat room from a bowl of chowder. That’s a fact that Internet predators count on as they prowl for young victims, and a situation that parents can no longer afford to ignore, New Castle County Police warned today as they ramped up efforts to give the public more weapons in the fight against pedophiles."
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2008-03-14
Kingston man gets 3 years in international child porn case
Mark Bedford, a 23-year-old man from Kingston, Ont., was sentenced to three years in prison Friday for his involvement in what authorities have called one of largest child porn cases ever prosecuted in Canada.
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2008-03-14
Libraries must report child pornography to police
Librarians across the United States should report child pornography to law enforcement despite their supervisors' reluctance to protect children, said Campaign for Children and Families, a leading California-based pro-family organization.
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2008-03-13
10 percent of Osaka school children complain of online harassment
More than one in 10 junior and senior high school students in the city of Osaka have been harassed or bad mouthed on Internet bulletin boards, blogs or via e-mail, according to a survey.
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2008-03-13
On Photobucket, babies in diapers are seen as 'nudity'
Photobucket is removing photos of babies in diapers from the site, saying they violate the terms of service because they depict "nudity."
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2008-03-13
Photobucket says it erred in censoring diapered babies
Scratch that last story, after Photobucket admits that it erroneously dumped the photos.
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2008-03-12
30 nabbed possessing child pornography
The Israel Police announced Wednesday that they had rounded up a large number of suspected pedophiles who had downloaded - and distributed - illicit materials through the Internet, but said that the operation was only one stage of a larger plan for 2008 to crack down on the phenomenon of Internet pedophilia.
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2008-03-11
UNICEF calls on Japan to crack down on child pornography
Japan should ban possession of child pornography and crack down on animated films, comic books and computer games that show children being sexually exploited, UNICEF said Tuesday.
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2008-03-11
Keeping kids from getting tangled up in the ‘Net
How young is too young for a child to join a social networking site like MySpace or Facebook? With the launch of sites like Disney Xtreme Digital and Club Penguin, younger children are being targeted to promote themselves on the Internet.
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2008-03-11
New Hampshire Senate Committee asked to protect children from online predators
On Monday, Governor John Lynch asked the New Hampshire Senate Judiciary Committee to continue the state's efforts to protect children from sexual predators by supporting the Online Child Safety Act.
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2008-03-10
Predators@yourkids.net
"Get over your fear of the internet, do it fast, and get involved yourself in the technologies your children are using, said Merlyn Horton of the Safe OnLine Outreach Society. Your children are literally at stake, she said." More from the SOLOS Roadshow.
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2008-03-10
Japan to outlaw possession of child porn
More on the Japanese government's decision to bring Japan in line with the international community by banning the possession of child pornography. Some still think they haven't gone far enough.
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2008-03-10
National CyberTipline marks 10 years of operation
The CyberTipline, the (U.S.) nation's system for reporting suspected sexual exploitation of children, will celebrate 10 years of operation this week. Operated by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, the CyberTipline has processed more than 570,000 reports of sex crimes against children, some as young as two weeks old.
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2008-03-10
Canadian pedophile suspect appears in court in Thailand
A Canadian arrested last year in a worldwide manhunt after Interpol unscrambled his swirled digital images from Internet photos appeared in court Monday in Thailand, accused of sexually abusing a 9-year-old boy.
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2008-03-10
Internet gets lion's share of kids' attention and increasingly influences what they watch on TV
With kids multitasking on TV, online and on digital devices, companies need to rethink their marketing strategies, according to a new social networking study. TV, once the dominant kids media, no longer gets their undivided attention, according to a study on social networking by Grunwald Associates LLC, an independent research firm that specializes in new media market intelligence.
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2008-03-09
Ban eyed on possession of child porn
The ruling coalition of the Japanese Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito likely will revise the law against child prostitution and child pornography to ban individual possession of child pornography. The move was decided due to international criticism of Japan over its failure to respond to increasing number of pornography cases victimizing children via the Internet.
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2008-03-09
Tougher child porn measure nears vote
New York State would toughen penalties against child pornography crimes — in some cases using laws aimed at organized crime — under legislation the State Senate is expected to approve early this week. The bill covers a variety of child exploitation issues, from possession and production of child pornography, to the presentation of Internet evidence in court. It also would offer counseling and “safe haven” services for exploited children.
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2008-03-08
Concern in Europe on cellphone ads for children
Shiny child-size phones are stirring some parental and government unease, particularly at a time when the mobile telephone industry is reaching deeper into saturated markets to tap customers with chubby hands capable of cradling both dolls and phones.
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2008-03-08
Face that haunts pedophile busters
It's a face that haunts police around the world. A young girl, probably now nine, who has grown up from infancy on film - thousands of pictures and movies shot of her being molested by an abuser who then shared the images with a network of like-minded internet pedophiles.
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2008-03-08
SXSWi: Steven Johnson, Henry Jenkins talk youth and collective intelligence
"In a lively discussion that focused on youth and collective intelligence, noted researchers and authors Steven Johnson and Henry Jenkins officially opened South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) on Saturday in the conference's first keynote address." A must-read blog post.
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2008-03-08
Internet task forces, net nannies, and the stupidity of not parenting
Spirited if somewhat opinionated blog post attacking parents for their apparent unwillingness to fully learn about the technology their children are immersed in.
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2008-03-08
Children targeted through Xbox Live
A Lansing, Michigan mother was shocked after her two children were subjected to nude pictures on Xbox Live. Michigan State Police say this disturbing crime should be a wake up call for parents. Video games are meant to be a haven mostly targeted towards children but just like logging onto the Internet, state police say online games have become a magnet for sexual predators.
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2008-03-08
Pornographic images sent through Xbox Live, parents turn off Xbox without getting gamertag
In a derisive response to the previous story about pornographic images on Xbox Live, parents and the media come in for more justifiable scorn over their general cluelessness toward the technology, not least because they could have prevented further occurrences had they acted more knowledgeably. Overly reliant on profanities, the writer nonetheless makes some excellent points.
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2008-03-08
Two convicted of drugging, raping high-schooler
Two young B.C. men have been convicted of giving a high school student a date-rape drug and sexually assaulting her, after they met on the Internet.
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2008-03-07
Microsoft helps AFP curb online nasties
The Australian Federal Police will use specially developed software from Microsoft to combat online child pornography.
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2008-03-06
Police crack global child porn ring
More information on the massive global porn sting.
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2008-03-06
Five-year-olds should be taught about online safety, say Tories
Children as young as five would be taught about the dangers of putting their personal details on the internet under plans drawn up by the Conservatives to tackle cyber-crime.
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2008-03-06
Myths exposed
A lot of parental worries about internet sex predators are unjustified, according to new research by a leading US centre that studies crimes against children.
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2008-03-06
MySpace announces step-up in safety measures
As part of its ongoing commitment to safety, MySpace today launched a new Internet safety public service announcement, partnerships with nonprofit organizations and web site to promote online safety awareness among parents, educators and teens.
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2008-03-06
Expert: Parents the key to safe Internet travel
''Don't take candy from strangers'' simply isn't enough anymore, Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Roth says.
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2008-03-05
Gay youth more likely to be exploited on Internet
Youth who are gay or are questioning their sexual identity are significantly more likely than others to be victims of Internet-initiated sex crimes. However, the vast majority of those encounters are illegal because of the age of the participant, not because of coercion or violence.
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2008-03-04
International child porn ring uncovered
More than 400,000 pictures, video files and other images showing children engaged in sexual behavior were produced, advertised, traded and distributed globally in a global online pornography ring, according to U.S. and international authorities. The sting, which started in Australia, also netted accused pornographers in England, Canada and Germany.
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2008-03-03
New program escalates fight against child pornography
Child pornography legislation in both the state of Utah and at the federal level has recently been introduced.
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2008-03-03
More Chinese children exposed to online danger
Children in China are far more likely to be exposed to online dangers than their foreign peers, a recent research report says.
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2008-03-03
Big brains from Harvard lead MySpace task force – but why?
This article is skeptical about the effectiveness of a group of technology and law experts fully addressing the protection of children online. The money quote: “Do they really think that better electronic solutions are going to do anything at all to this generation of techno-savvy kids? You may as well try to hold your hands up to stop a tsunami." (Dr. Larry Rosen)
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2008-03-03
David Pogue downplays online safety challenges for kids and teens
Amy Tiemann's response to, and partial rebuttal of, David Pogue's recent New York Times blog post, which she believes "dangerously minimizes the seriousness of the challenges that online life poses for families."
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2008-03-02
Protecting Children Online
Parents trying to keep their kids safe online may be startled to hear that only two percent of the people known to traffic child pornography are ever prosecuted. Now Senator Tim Johnson and other legislators are trying to change that. Senator Johnson has co-sponsored the Combating Child Exploitation Act of 2007, which aims to prevent cyber crimes involving children.
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2008-03-02
Team focuses on web paedophiles
Det Insp Simon Snell, head of the Devon and Cornwall Police's Force Online Investigation team, says the number of paedophiles using the internet to target and abuse children is still growing worryingly.
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2008-02-29
Long Island DAs, lawmakers endorse e-STOP legislation
Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice and Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota announced last week their support for Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's new Electronic Security and Targeting of Online Predators Act (e-STOP) legislation and its protections against sexual predators online.
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2008-02-29
Harvard leads investigation into online safety of children
With online safety an ongoing concern when it comes to interaction with the Internet, and specifically social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook, a task force of Net experts headed by Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society are to investigate how to better protect children from potentially dangerous outside influences.
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2008-02-28
Child porn's shadow darkens
Extensive if fairly alarmist article on the apparently increasing prevalence of child porn and the online exploitation of children.
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2008-02-28
The Berkman Center announces formation of Internet Safety task force to identify and develop online safety tools
The Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School today announced that it will head a newly formed Internet Safety Technical Task Force. The Task Force, comprised of leading Internet businesses and organizations, will focus on identifying effective online safety tools and technologies that can be used by many companies across multiple platforms.
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2008-02-28
MySpace: Coming of age for coming of age
Serious questions are being raised about how to control minors' access to online social networking sites. Critics are skeptical about privacy issues raised by age verification on social networks.
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2008-02-28
How dangerous is the Internet for children?
"A few years ago, a parenting magazine asked me to write an article about the dangers that children face when they go online. As it turns out, I was the wrong author for the article they had in mind." David Pogue examines some of the myths and misinformation surrounding the topic.
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