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Welcome to the SafeKids/NetFamilyNewsletter and thanks to everyone who's just subscribed! Please invite friends and colleagues to sign up and help us to help grownups stay informed about children's safe, constructive use of the Internet. Email us anytime!

January 23, 2004

Dear Subscribers:

Here's our lineup for this third week of January:

• Teen subscriber writes: Kids like P2P risks
  
• Web News Briefs: UK mobile phone cos. nix porn for kids; Cybercafe curb for Tokyo teens?; Spam filters' downside; Euro kids prefer Net games to music; Child-pornographer flypaper?; How to beat email scams....

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Teen subscriber writes: Kids like P2P risks

We really value the insights teen subscribers provide when they take the time to email us. In response to our report last week that "Illegal file-sharing's up," 18-year-old Sandy in New Jersey sent a comment and a question, the latter a helpful heads-up for everybody on the need to check for spyware on the PCs. We later learned more from Sandy and some follow-up research we did on file-sharing, as you'll see below...

1. Sandy's comment

   "I feel that the surge in file-sharing is due to the fact that it is illegal. Most teenage kids don't let the law get in the way when it comes to file- sharing. People like myself, however, don't file-share anymore, but I know quite a few who actually started sharing files just for the risk. I think they should stop with all of these lawsuits. They have just managed to create a larger problem for themselves. While I don't have the slightest idea how to fix the problem, this surely doesn't seem like the correct way to go about it." [Later she wrote: "Most of the people I know refuse to pay to download music if they can find it somewhere else for free. It's still too expensive to buy CDs. I just haven't been downloading or buying CDs. I just listen to whatever I hear on the radio or the CDs I burned before the big RIAA lawsuits."]

   "Another comment - are there any programs to download music without spyware/adware? Recently, my computer had a major crash. Why? Because of the 2 aforementioned things. Not only can they be gotten from downloading clients such as Kazaa, Soulseek, and Grokster, but just from visiting everyday Web pages with pop-ups. In a 5-minute period of looking for song lyrics, I ran my spyware programs and found out that my computer contained 6 new spyware trackers and 3 new adware programs. This is ludicrous in my opinion. When my computer went down after the crash, it was cleaned, and I was told that between adware and spyware, there were almost 150 different trackers. I was appalled and disgusted. It's sad to think that by just browsing Web sites you can pick up so many different little trackers that you wouldn't even know about. I suggest that everyone get a spyware and adware checker [see Ad-aware maker Lavasoft.com or Tucows to download the free version of Ad-aware spyware-scan-and-delete software]. This is a serious problem."

2. Follow-up question on her online life

   When we asked Sandy how and where she uses the Net, she kindly responded:

   "I use it at home. When I go to college next school year, it will be primarily there. We have 2 computers in the house. This computer [the one she's typing on] is primarily used by me.... I use the computer for instant-messaging, journaling [see "Teens' blog life" last week], and school research. Journaling is probably the highest and the other two are of the same [secondary] importance. My computer is on usually from when I get out of school to when I go to bed. Half of that time, I'm near the computer but not on or I'm playing a game (games such as The Sims, Zoombinis or RollerCoaster Tycoon). Most of the people I talk to are those from school or people who have moved and I don't get talk to in person all that much."

3. Of Soulseek, Kazaa Lite, and other 'spyware-free' P2P services

   At Sandy's mention of it, we checked out Soulseek, which also claims to be ad- and spyware-free. Soulseek is an interesting twist on the file-sharing phenomenon. Unlike Kazaa, it aims to be small, specific ("electronic/techno/dance music"), and just as much about community as about music-downloading. Another novel aspect of it is its financial model. According file-sharing guide Slyck.com, "the more support a person gives [Soulseek], the higher priority they receive in the queues [for music files]. In other words: each $5 spot a user shells out gets them closer to being first in line and closer to the music they want." Slyck has very informative, clickable descriptions of various "file-sharing methods" for parents who want to read up on these things.

   We asked Sandy if she'd tried Soulseek and if she believed its and Kazaa Lite's claims about being spyware-free: "I did try Soulseek. I honestly couldn't figure out how to work it. I don't doubt there's spyware on there somewhere. Nothing is completely spyware-free from what I've recently learned. (I have to scan my computer with my Spybot and Ad-Aware every time I get off the Internet because I find that even looking at a couple sites gets me a dozen pieces of spy and adware.)... Kazaa Lite, so I've heard, takes forever to download the right song. A friend tells me that it may say the file you are looking for but it is a completely different file all together." [In some cases the faked files Sandy's friend is describing are porn and viruses that can be downloaded by unsuspecting file-sharers. BTW, here's an old Wired News piece on Kazaa Lite.]

   For more info

   • Great source for parents: Slyck's informative, clickable "Guide to File- Sharing Methods" on the left-hand side of its home page - everything from eDonkey2000 to BitTorrent to FastTrack, and all the sub-versions of these (for when you've found one of these sites or software applications on your family PC and wondered what it is). Another source is Zeropaid.com, "the file-sharing portal."

   • Interview with Soulseek's lead programmer. Slyck talks with Nir Arbel, who "maintains close contact with the SoulSeek community, something that is perhaps more important than the network size or availability of files."

   • The RIAA this week announced 500+ more lawsuits (the biggest number yet) against people accused of file-sharing, the Electronic Freedom Foundation reported in a press release. Because of the federal court decision in December, the RIAA will have to seek permission from judges before they can issue subpoenas to ISPs seeking the identities of the file-sharers, the EFF added. "The process offers more due process and privacy protections than the automatic subpoenas the DC Circuit court rejected in the RIAA v. Verizon case." CNET put the number at 532, calling it the largest number of lawsuits the RIAA's filed since the start of its legal campaign against online piracy. The Washington Post says there are two schools of thought on the RIAA's strategy: that it's working and that it's not.

   • Musician's-eye-view of music-downloading. It's not a pretty picture. " A hornet's nest of performance and publishing copyright laws, marketing decisions, artists' egos and negotiating power plays can stop people from legally buying songs on the Internet, just as millions are trying to do so for the first time," the Washington Post reports, leading with the case of the Internet-savvy Tom Petty.

   • "Cross-platform" file-sharing. The makers of Morpheus P2P software "released a test version ... that taps into all major file-swapping networks, including Kazaa," ZDNet UK reports. If it works, this could be nirvana for file-sharers - "bridging formerly separate networks" and "promising to improve the efficiency of peer-to-peer searches and sharpen competition among rival software developers." It would also be a leap closer to turning the Internet into a global music library. And bad news for record companies.

   • Kazaa delivers viruses as well as music. "Forty-five percent of the executable files downloaded through Kazaa ... contain malicious code like viruses and Trojan horses," Wired News recently reported, but Slyck this week offered some balance, including a quote from Kazaa's makers saying the 45% seems high because software comes with virus protection. Slyck says simple PC security steps include "include keeping antivirus software current and not downloading files with suspicious extensions. It remains surprising the amount of people who still download VBS or EXE files."

   • Virus writers' own P2P networks. They're setting up P2P networks to help spread their malicious code, or "malware," the BBC reports. They use the networks to control PCs that have been infected, and they like file-sharing because "because peer-to-peer networks are hard to disrupt, making viruses using this technique hard to stop spreading."

   • File-sharing fueling software piracy. The recording industry's lawsuits have gotten the lion's share of media attention, but software companies fear the peer-to-peer services too. "Long before downloading music and movies became a hobby of teenagers and others, the software industry was struggling to keep digital pirates at bay. Even in the pre-Internet 1980s, introducing software was fraught with peril," according to the New York Times. The industry developed copy protection safeguards, so that piracy "declined somewhat," but the file-sharing boom "is quickly eroding those gains." Software apps can be swapped on Kazaa and Grokster just as easily as tunes.

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Web News Briefs

1. UK mobile phone cos.: No porn for kids

   This certainly seems progressive (and a good example for other countries?): Britain's six mobile phone companies - Orange, O2, T-Mobile, 3, Virgin Mobile, and Vodafone - announced this week that they've agreed to help prevent kids and teens from accessing "porn, gaming, and other unsuitable content on their mobile phones," The Register reports. According to ZDNet UK, "commercial mobile content will be subject to independent classification, and mobile operators will place access controls on content classified as '18,' making it available only to those customers over 18 whose age has been verified - using valid ID at the point of sale or a third-party credit check." The companies will monitor the use of chat rooms by children ("in a bid to prevent the services being hijacked by paedophiles," the Register reports) and make filters available to parents. ZDNet added that the move was in response to "concerns that mobile devices with enhanced features such as colour screens, picture messaging, video cameras, and Internet browsers can be used to access a growing variety of media-rich content, some of which could be unsuitable for children."

2. Cybercafe curb for Tokyo teens?

   The city assembly of Tokyo will soon consider adding Internet cafes to a 1964 ordinance requiring entertainment venue operators "not to accept minors late at night," the Singapore Straits Times reports. An advisory panel to Tokyo's governor made the recommendation to the governor. It also included curbs on late-night use of karaoke parlors by minors and "the sale of teenage girls' used underwear" and proposed requiring vending machines to be programmed to prevent minors from buying pornography. (Our thanks to BNA Internet Law for pointing this item out.)

3. The downside of spam filters

   This newsletter knows something about this! We have readers subscribe and never receive an issue because of spam filters. The Wired News headline is "Spam Filters Grab Good with the Bad." "While vigorous filtering will purge spam from in-boxes, it can also act as an unintended censor," according to Wired News. But if you're reading this, your filters aren't censoring us for our reports on spam, anti-child-porn efforts, and other topics that filters don't like!

4. Euro kids prefer Net games to music

   Children in Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and Ireland "spend more time playing games on the Internet than sending emails or downloading music," according to a recent survey cited in The Register. The study, by EU-backed Safety, Awareness, Facts and Tools (SAFT), found that 90% of kids 9-16 in Nordic countries play online games, compared to 64% in Ireland. "On average the children [surveyed] play online games 2.3 hours per week. Girls play games almost as much as boys, but boys play more online. Boys favour action, sports, and war strategy titles, while girls prefer 'god' sims."

5. Child-pornographer flypaper?

   It's a Web site developed by "a global law enforcement initiative launched last month by police in Britain, the United States, and Australia," the Washington Post reports, and it has all the graphical appeal a pedophile would like. Also known as a "honey pot," it's part of Operation Pin, a Web-based sting to entrap buyers and sellers of child pornography. It's also meant to deter. "The project's global presence denies child pornographers the ability to navigate the Net with confidence. While kiddie porn may seem like the vilest possible bait for cyber-stings, law enforcement officials from the FBI to Scotland Yard to Interpol assert that using such fake Web sites ... is overwhelmingly effective ammunition in the war against child pornography. Ethically and legally, this particular form of online deceit is seen as good public policy. Moreover, it's cheap, easy and cost-effective. And for the moment, it's even legal."

6. How to beat email scams

   They're called "phishing" expeditions. A customer receives an email requesting that she update her personal account information. The email contains a link to what looked like a page on a bank's or ISP's Web site requesting that the customer plunk in her social security number or some such personal information (not behind a password or any other protective barrier). The customer doesn't notice that the email's return address looks suspicious or that a user name and password should be required. So when she does plunk in her s.s. number, she becomes the victim of an increasingly common type of scam - from impersonators of Citibank and BankOne to Amazon and eBay, ZDNet reports. The article helpfully explains how these scams work and what to do when you get a scam email.

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That does it for this week. Have a great weekend!

Sincerely,

Anne Collier, Editor

Net Family News

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