Spotting the risks in technologies and
cyberactivities is as easy as 1-2-3C’s. Everything falls into one or more of
these 3C categories.
1. Content = information, pictures, audio, video,
porn, hate, misinformation and hype.
2. Contact = any technology or feature that lets
you talk to others or them to talk to you, like IM, iChat, text, cell phone
calls, BBMs, forums and voice-over-IP.
3. Cost = anything that can end up costing you
money, like viruses, ID theft, lawsuits for downloading other people’s
copyrighted content, loss of files and hacking. It also includes the commercial
risks of advertising, marketing and fraud.
Content Risks:
“Content” is anything that is
information, images, video, music or audio, text…it’s the biggest category of
all 3C’s. There are lots of different kinds of content risks. These include
pornography, hate and bigotry, misinformation and hype. There are content risks
that promote risky conduct too. These include bomb-building and sites that include
misinformation about suicide, eating disorders, drug abuse and gambling. (If
the site actually promotes, encourages or assists in users engaging in
self-harm, dangerous behavior or abuse, it may also be a conduct risk, a 4th
category of “c” risks dealing with behavior, not digital capabilities.)
Some common categories of “content”
risks include:
Pornography
Pornography
is on the top of everyone’s gross list. Everyone wants to be spared from
unwanted disgusting graphic images online. Luckily, for younger kids, parental
controls and filtering software do a good job of screening out most of the porn
content. But when teens are looking for innocent stuff online, they may end up
at gross sites by accident.
When
anyone searches for information online, or mistypes or misspells a domain name,
they may find themselves at a pornography site.
When they open their e-mail boxes or instant messages they may find
themselves targeted by slimy ads for porn sites too. Many use the names of your
favorite celebrities to trick you into visiting those sites, thinking they are
for fans.
And
if they stumble upon a pornography site, they may find themselves locked in an
avalanche of new pornographic windows, unable to escape without having to shut
down their computers (“mousetrapping”).
And sometimes when they type in the URL of their favorite site, they end
up at a pornography site instead, either because traffic for that site had been
redirected by a pornography site (“hijacking”) or because the site owner had
forgotten to renew their domain name registration (“porn-napping”).
When
some creepy person registers and uses a website that is designed to trick kids
into going there, because they would think it’s for kids, that is now illegal.
They are called Misleading Domain Names. Someone in NY went to jail for years
because he did this.
You
can report any misleading domain names to the cybertipline.org. It’s one of the
types of reports that the US government decided should be reported to them.
Hate,
Intolerance and Bigotry
We
need to be highly suspicious when sites promote hate, intolerance, and bigotry.
If they do this out in the open, we will ignore them and they know this. But,
if they are very sneaky about it, they may get in under our radar. There are
many sites that claim the Holocaust never happened. Others mock racial minority
groups, people with disabilities, those will different sexual preferences, ethnic
groups and religious groups. Some promote intolerance by promoting racial
supremacy. Sadly, hate, intolerance and
bigotry are like poison ivy, if you touch it – it spreads and infects everyone
who comes into contact with it!
This
is one place where we need to use the filter between our ears. Don’t believe
everything you see or hear or read online.
Judge
Judy told Parry that there are lots of “kooks and crackpots” online. She was
right! (But isn’t Judge Judy always right?)
Violence
and Gore
Teens
and preteens (especially boys) often search for gory sites filled with
amputated body parts and people clubbing baby seals. They also create their own gory and violent
videos and post them on YouTube, YouTube and MySpace. It’s their own form of
“reality TV.”
Misinformation
and Hype
How
can we tell the real and reliable stuff from the kooks, pyramid schemes,
crackpots or outright lies? That’s why
it’s important that we learn about information literacy, what and whom to
believe online and off.
Cyber
Hoaxes, Rumors, and Urban Legends
Rumors, especially those that sound
believable, have been around for centuries. It isn’t any different in
cyberspace. In fact, they move faster online than they ever could offline. Most
good hoaxes and rumors have three main ingredients—they could happen (or sounds
like they could), they touch something we know about or think is true and they
feed on fear. The difference between a rumor and a hoax is that while hoaxes
are planned by the people who started them as fakes, rumors may be believed by
the person who started them and innocently passed on.
Contact Risks:
The second most common risk is
“contact.” Contact involves any digital feature or technolofy that allows you
to reach out and communicate with someone or them to reach you. It is targeted
to one or more specific users, not everyone who reads your profile. (That’s “content”
not “contact”.) It includes obvious technologies like cell phone calls,
texting, IM, e-mails, webcams and private messages on Facebook. But it also
included Xbox 360 live and other gaming devices voice-chat, status messages,
video and standard blogs, Picto-Chat on DS, DSi and Wii communication tools, and
tagging images with messages.
While you may know what these devices
and features can do to connect you with others, parents don’t. And younger kids
are too young to appreciate the risks associated with contact tools. Spotting
the ways new technologies, online and on gaming and handheld devices can be
used to contact others can make the difference between being safe and in
control or being hurt or getting into trouble.
Addressing
Contact Risks:
Most
contact technologies have user controls or privacy settings that let you decide
who can reach you. Before you start using a site, or new device or feature see
if you have user controls to block people when they become annoying, or limit
access to just your friends and approved callers or senders. Some can limit
whom you can call on your cell phone too. The choice of who you talk with
should be yours!
Find
out how you can turn off some of these features so only friends can contact
you. See if you can prescreen communications from people you don’t know. Come
up with a “code” so your friends can prove it’s really them, instead of someone
posing as them or using their account without their knowledge or permission.
Buddy
lists on IM and friends lists on Facebook are communication tools that help
give you control over who can contact you. Xbox 360 has extensive controls over
contact features, too. Knowing how to
set and use these tools will help you stay safer.
Not
every risk has a technology fix. Many rely on careful and educated use. Do you
know enough? I bet you have something you don’t know already. Visit the
websites run by the technology or device provider. What do they tell you the
technology can do? Do they give you information about privacy settings and
communication controls? What about the use manual? Spend some time searching
online for tips to that technology. (It’s a shame that often the best info can
be found by users, not from the companies themselves.)
Then,
share, share, share!!! Post your solutions online, let the companies know they
need to post them too and insist that before you buy some new fun device they
know their technology better than you do. Together we can make things safer.
Cost/Commercialism Risks:
The 3rd C, Cost, has two parts. The
first involves the risks to your technology (such as viruses and hacking),
legal risks (like being sued for illegally downloading music, having your
digital video camera seized for being brought into a movie theater or for
hacking someone else) and direct costs, such as calling China, sending 5,000
text-messages or having someone send you text-bombs of 5,000 messages,
downloading ringtones with viruses or that cost money, ID theft or buying too
many applications online for your budget. The second category of cost-related
risks is also called “commercial risks.” These include inappropriate or
fraudulent advertisements or marketing practices. Pop-up promises to give away
iPods for winning a short game or for being the 1 millionth person to visit a
site fall into this category. So do ads for Viagra or sexy lingerie marketed to
minors online. Tricks used to get your parents credit card info or bank account
details, or for you to give away your passwords or logins so they can use your
account to send out gross junk e-mail are “cost” risks too.
Anything that costs you or your
parents money, wrecks your technology, files or devices, steals your accounts
or cash or gathers your personal information without your knowledge is a
“cost/commercial” risk.
The 4th C - Conduct Risks:
The 3Cs are about risks that can
exploit the technology. The 4th – conduct is about teens exploiting themselves
or others. Acting out online, cyberbullying others and doing things you would
never do offline are the kinds of things that make up this 4th category of “C”
risks – conduct. It’s also when teens visit certain sites to help them engage
in dangerous activities, like building bombs, buying weapons and poisons,
eating disorders, cutting, attempting suicide and online gambling. While most
teens can avoid these and don’t understand the attraction, those who are needy
or at risk can’t.
Bomb-building
Learning
how to build a bomb is as simple as typing the word “bomb” into your favorite
search engine. While teens can just as easily find the bomb-building
information at their local library, the instant access makes it more accessible
and more tempting when they are bored. The Anarchists’ Cookbook, is posted all
over the Internet and explains how you can buy whatever you need at your local
grocery, hardware, and farming supply stores to build a bomb. (It even includes
a recipe to make nitroglycerin.) The really frightening part is that thousands
of teenagers have told Parry that they might try to build a bomb just to see if
it works. Even good teens could be a bomb threat if they get bored one
afternoon. That’s pretty scary!
Suicide
Sites
There
are a growing number of websites devoted to helping people and encouraging them
to commit suicide. They include helplines to assist those who are trying to
commit suicide, information about the different methods and even webcams where
their members can watch you die. These are becoming more popular every day.
Several of the cyberbullying-related suicide victims visited one of these sites
before taking their own life.
Sadly,
while the sites that encourage suicide are growing rapidly, the sites from
groups that try to discourage suicide are not. Many of the groups that fight
suicide and assist troubled children and adults are still afraid of the
technology or providing online help.
Fortunately,
Facebook and other leading industry networks are now providing links to suicide
help group sites and accepting reports from users when others have posted
suicidal comments.
Eating
Disorder and Emotional Disorder Sites and Groups
Bulimia,
anorexia and cutting are emotional disorders that affect many teens. And the
Internet has made it easier for teens to find others with similar disorders.
Once they join these online communities, it makes it harder for them to resist.
And it makes it harder for their parents and friends to detect and combat.
Having others encouraging their dangerous behaviors makes this a serious risk
to all teens, especially during their early teen impressionable years.
Drug
Abuse
A
few years ago, a teen died while abusing drugs. While that is not unusual, the
fact that he did it on a webcam and we have video images of him dying while
others in a special drug abuse chatroom encouraged him to “take more” is.
Many
teens feel alone. And finding a place where they are accepted is important to
them. If that means they are abusing drugs, or engaging in other high risk
behavior to fit in, it is often the price to pay. And many teens are willing to
pay it. In addition to encouraging dangerous behavior, these website and online
groups give them a place where they feel accepted, even if they are doing
dangerous or illegal things. They feel more like the norm and less like the
exception, when others are doing the same things they are.
Weapon,
Poisons and Drug Sales
Several
years ago, a young boy in the United States used his father’s American Express
card to buy an automatic revolver online and had it shipped to his house. He
obviously hadn’t thought about what would happen when the credit card bill
arrived! Luckily, his mother intercepted the package and confiscated the gun.
Gambling
Online
gambling, poker and games of chance are among the most popular activities
online among adults. Is it a surprise that they are also popular among teens?
They are addictive and are costing teens their entire life savings. Fantasy
sports leagues help feed the hunger for gambling as well. Teens are using their
own money to gamble online. Unfortunately, while they may be able to send their
money to the website in order to gamble, many sites are either fraudulent or
may refuse to send them their winnings for other reasons. And since even in the
US online gambling is not regulated (just using a credit card or other
financial institution to pay for it is) there isn’t much you can do about it.
“Cybering,”
“Sexting” and Sharing Sexually Provocative Images and Videos You’ve seen them, you’ve heard about them and
maybe you even did it once or twice yourself. It’s so easy to do things online
you would never dream about doing in real life. Maybe you were bored, or
everyone else at the slumber party was doing it, or you did it on a dare.
But
if you are under the age of 18 in the US, you may find yourself charged with
creating, distributing or possessing child pornography, even if it’s of
yourself.
Gangs
Online
Most
of us think that gangs exist only on the inner city streets. But, like everyone
else, they exist online too. And their online activities have helped them
recruit teens they would never have come into contact with in “RL” (“real
life”). They can create glamorous videos on YouTube, fundraise and spread
propaganda about what they do.
