ROCKWALL, TX (Nov. 14, 2014) One can never be too careful when it comes to protecting children from online predators and the various other dangers that come with surfing the World Wide Web. These criminals can post their online profiles and pose as anyone in order to stalk, prey, bully and extort their young victims, all from the privacy of their own homes and with the freedom of anonymity that social media sites and chatrooms often provide.
The Heath Department of Public Safety showcased its commitment to keeping the community and its children safe from these online criminals with a free presentation on internet safety on Thursday night. Brian Burton, who’s served as a detective with the Heath DPS for seven years, led the session held inside the Heath City Hall Community Room.
Burton discussed all of the ways that parents can protect their children from falling victim to an online predator, including setting the location of the household computer in a place that’s visible to everyone, monitoring your child’s time spent on the web, and learning the lingo used by young teens in online chatrooms.
Burton also urged those in attendance to clean up their friends list on Facebook and other social media sites, and to not befriend anyone on social media you don’t know personally, as oftentimes online pedophiles will attempt to appeal to their potential victims by creating fake online profiles.
“Basically what we have with sites like Facebook is an individual will ask if they can become your friend, and you can either tell them yes or no,” Burton said. “But the question you want to ask yourself is do I want to share my personal information – my personal story – with this person? That’s the kind of question you want to ask as you’re getting these friend requests.”
According to Burton, young teens – mainly ages 13 to 15 – often see Facebook as a popularity contest, trying to see how many friends one can get in their friends list. Facebook helps this process by sending friend suggestions based on who you’ve already become friends with. This often leads to having hundreds of friends on your Facebook account, only a few of which you know personally and many you’ve never even met.
“I always tell kids to really know who their friends are,” Burton said. “I tell them to go home, look at your friends list and clean it up. Only allow information to those individuals who they would want to share personal information with.”
Guests were also treated to cake and cookies and a meet-and-greet with some Heath DPS officers before the presentation.
Story and photo by Austin Wells, Blue Ribbon News staff writer and reporter.
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