The internet is, at present, a fundamental tool to carry out all kinds of tasks. Provided it is under proper supervision, minors can take advantage of various applications and web platforms, both in an academic and recreational sense.
However, when children are allowed to access without any kind of restriction, all the content offered by the internet runs the risk that they enter websites that affect (directly or indirectly) their integrity.
These risks can be grouped into 4 major dangers, which I will present below, so you know what you should be aware of when your child accesses the internet.
1. Explicit Content Hazard
It is based on any kind of content, textual or graphic, that may affect the evolutionary development in which your child is. This includes everything from the most obvious, such as regular pornography, obscenities via webcam and war content, to snuff movies (videos where people are tortured or killed), the drug trade and other illegal practices.
If we start from the fact that there are so many good and bad people, and knowing that they all have access to the internet, encountering some kind of this content is not a difficult task. In fact, social networks like Twitter, whose content restriction is very little strict, is a clear example of this.
2. Contact Hazard
One of the best known dangers of the internet and one with the largest number of underage victims in recent years. The popularity of dating apps like Tinder or similar, has made knowing strangers living near your location, has become noticeably easier. On the other hand, Internet harassment or cyberbullying are also part of the risk that your child may suffer through misuse (along with other aspects) of social networks. Not to mention the old risk of interacting with strangers through any other messaging platform.
3. Danger of Discharging Contaminated Files
Having lived far fewer years of experience, it is natural that minors are much more innocent in certain aspects. One of them, is the belief that several of the advertisements that offer gifts and / or opportunities are real. Although the times have changed and the announcements have become less and less obvious, they still exist. And, therefore, the risk of accessing high-risk websites or downloading files loaded with malign codes (viruses) persists.
4. Danger of Internet Addiction
In this sense, both young people and adults are exposed to falling addicted to the excessive use of the Internet. However, children and adolescents with less obligations and more free time, are more exposed to suffer from this type of addiction. Over time, they can generate a dependency so marked that the restriction of the Internet would cause a discomfort as strong as abstinence from drugs. Internet debauchery can have serious consequences for the child, once the time has come for it to develop in different areas as an adult.
Parental control apps – the solution:
In order to project a better future, and to reduce the risk of these cyber-attacks, it is the parents’ duty to establish and maintain clear limits regarding the use and management of the Internet.
The best thing they can do is to know that these events do happen, and protect their children through parental control apps such as FamilyTime that alert and limit the use and publication of certain content on the web.
