FeedsInternet safety seminars planned
The explosive popularity of blogs and social-networking websites such as MySpace.com have brought a growing concern among law enforcement officers about the risk to children who travel unsupervised in cyberspace.
Sgt. Scott Hilden, community relations officer with the Canton Police Department, is planning to educate parents about the existence and inevitable dangers of a website where you can pretend to be anybody.
“I’m not against the Internet. I’m not against MySpace.com,” said Hilden. “Those are all part of the culture that kids are growing up in today. The dangers that come with them, however, are what is so important to pass along to the teenagers.”
Canton Township hasn’t had to face a story such as that of a 13-year-old Harrison Township girl, immortalized in local media reports as the “MySpace teen,” who ran off to Jordan to meet a man she met on the site. The man was not prosecuted, because investigators believed that the two did not have sexual contact and that the man believed the girl when she claimed she was 18.
Still, that case and others across the nation reveal that teenagers may not know exactly what danger they could be putting themselves in.
“I know that (in Canton) there have been incidents where someone in a chat room had contacted two juveniles and talked to them about sex and different activities,” said Hilden. “I’ve talked to parents who had teenage daughters who met somebody online. They brought me in to talk with them about it.”
“There’s a lot of stuff, I’m certain, that has gone unreported,” he added.
The purpose of the seminar is for parents and their children to recognize the risks beforehand. Hilden will discuss social networking and pornographic websites as well as offer suggestions on how to block them with special software.
“We don’t just throw our kids the car keys one day and say go drive. There’s driver’s training,” he said. “We don’t throw them on the Internet without training, either.”
The free seminar takes place at the Summit on the Park, from 9-11 a.m. on Aug. 26. Space is limited, so police ask that attendees call (734) 394-5325 to reserve a seat.
