When summer comes to an end, you and your preteen are likely gathering all the right school supplies — including digital devices. In the rush to begin school prep, don’t forget to share these safety tips to help your child stay safe online.
1. What you post on the internet, stays online forever
Remind your child that social media posts and images shared online can have consequences offline. Once posted, messages cannot be taken back. Even if the message is deleted, it may still exist on other people’s computers and circulate online. Encourage them to be mindful of the language, pictures and videos that they post or are tagged in.
2. Never talk to strangers privately online
Just as you want to know your child’s friends IRL (in real life), it’s a good idea to know online friends. Learn what social media websites they are using and be sure they are only engaging with trusted accounts.
3. Keep personal info private
Be sure to talk about the importance of online privacy. Use privacy settings to restrict who can access and post on your child’s social media profiles and turn geotagging features off so their location stays private. Sometimes privacy settings get reset to default settings during program updates, so check profiles often.
Remind them to protect personal information such as a Social Security number, home address, full name, phone number and account passwords.
Do your part
Consider installing web-filtering software to better protect your child from online threats like inappropriate sites, phishing scams or malware, and child-safe search browsers to limit your child’s access to certain sites, words and images.
Monitoring solutions for mobile devices can also set time restraints on how long your child gets access to screen time. This can help balance online and offline activities.
Just as you take steps to protect yourself online, be sure to guide your child toward being a good digital citizen and always staying safe online.
