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From Det. Bob Williams: Basic Net safety at home, Part 1Readers' comments on any of these resources are alsways welcome! Do email us via feedback@netfamilynews.org.Having two daughters in elementary and middle school had a lot to do with Bob Williams's interest in Internet crimes against children six years ago. He'd been a police officer for nearly 20 years, but the Net's popularity with kids pointed to a whole new area of police work. He noticed an increase in Net-related cases among teenagers, including "harassment, threats of school violence, and attempts to entice a minor to engage in sex," he told us. He also noticed that "the parents of these children that received the unwanted messages didn't have a clue how the computer or Internet worked. I advised my supervisors that the Internet is the new frontier, and training is required."
Many training seminars - in protecting young Net users, tracking child predators online, and computer forensics - later, Detective Williams is now Youth Officer in the Greenwich, Conn., Police Department's Criminal Investigation Division, and about 30% of his caseload concerns the Internet (he also spends considerable time educating fellow parents about kids on the Net).
We asked Bob what sorts of cases parents can bring him. "If a parent feels their child has been threatened with bodily harm, is in danger, or is being harassed online, they should contact the local police department. There are Connecticut state laws in place regarding harassment by telephone or other electronic devices which allow me to pursue these complaints. Not all of the investigations end in criminal court. Most of the cases are resolved with a trip to the police station for a talk or a telephone call to the parent because the child was not aware that his online activity can be traced."
* * * Detective Williams's Tip No. 1 - The key to a safe, constructive experience for children surfing the Internet is Parental Supervision."Six years ago my partner got a call from a frantic parent of an 11-year-old boy. The mother said (snail) mail from all over the United States, addressed to her son, was being delivered to their house. Upon opening the letters the mother found cash and checks. She requested that the police look into this.
"My partner met with the mother and son after school and presented her concerns to the boy. The child said he had many duplicate Pokemon cards, so he went online, built a free Web page, scanned the cards, and posted their photos on the Web page for sale.
"The mother was somewhat embarrassed because she didn't know about the free Web page - her son obviously didn't tell her - but she was relieved to locate the problem and started closely supervising her son's activities. He learned a lesson too: that he was lucky a predator didn't reach out to him.
"I share this case to remind parents about how important it is to keep up with your child's Net activities. Ask questions, stop at the computer when your child is online, and ask about who he or she is IM-ing or emailing. How does she know that person online? Where online activities are concerned, parents can't be their child's friend. Just be the concerned parent."
Det. Bob Williams is a father of two high school students and Youth Officer in the Greenwich, Conn., Police Department. You'll find other parts of this series here.
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