Chat room problems

In outline below is one of the most significant cases of chat room abuse that has happened in the last three years:

A former US marine faced likely extradition to the United States and a possible 30 year jail sentence after he pleaded guilty to abducting a 12-year-old British schoolgirl he courted on the Internet.

Demands grew for changes in the law to tackle Internet grooming after former sergeant, Toby Studabaker, 33 , appeared at Manchester Crown Court to plead guilty to abduction and incitement to gross indecency involving a girl he met on the internet.

On the 13th July 2003 the girl disappeared from her parents’ home in Lowton, near Wigan. The girl left after tricking her mother into handing over her passport by saying she needed it for a bus pass.

Her family believed she was spending the day with friends, but by 2:30pm the girl had met up with Studabaker and the pair had flown from Manchester to Heathrow. By 5:50pm, they had caught a flight to Paris Charles de Gaulle airport.
At 8pm that night her parents contacted the police, and by the next morning detectives had begun examining the computer on which she spent many hours surfing and chatting, quickly discovering her relationship with Studabaker.

She had been chatting with him for almost a year. The evidence proved that Studabaker knew the exact age of his victim. "The content of many of the e-mails and chats show that the defendant knew his victim was 12 years old in 2003."

What can you do to prevent this? The important thing is to talk to your child about their use of the Internet. Read the ‘Talking to your children’ unit.

Become an Internet user yourself and even take part in a few chat sessions. Then you will have a better understanding of the way the technology works and it will not seem unusual to your children that you are interested in their online activities.

Your children should understand the following rules which will help them avoid the consequences of the case outlined above. It might be useful to print them and place them above the computer or alternatively they should be part of the Family Internet Computer Policy:

1. If you're asked for a screen name to use in a chatroom use a nickname - never your real name.
2. They could try creating a nickname by using the technique discussed in creating a password in the ‘Protecting yourself unit’
3. If you're in a chatroom and you start feeling uncomfortable about what someone's saying, get out of there and tell an adult.
4. People may not be who they say they are.
5. Look at the example in the ‘Protecting yourself unit’
6. If you get an e-mail telling you not to tell your parents about it, don't reply and tell an adult straight away.

Question your children about the private chat areas of the chat area that they are using.

What is private chat?

This is using part of a chatroom where other people can't see what you're saying. In a private chat area the rules should almost be the same as they would be in the public chat area:

• Never agree to a private chat with someone unless you already know them face-to-face, in real life.

Children can also have private chats on "Instant Messaging".
Instant messaging - sometimes shortened to IM - is a computer program that allows you to send messages that other users receive straight away. The safety rules for IM are:

• It is best only to get involved in IM with people you already know in real life.
• If you get to a chatroom through Instant Messaging, remember to follow the same safety rules you would use if you were chatting anywhere else.

What info shouldn’t the children give out?
Unless they have an adult's permission they should never ever give out:
• Their real name
• Their home, school or e-mail address
• Their phone number
• Their photo.

Again the important message is to talk to your children. Safe use of the Internet will happen when the children are aware of the real dangers and have discussed and argued with you about what these real dangers are.

 

 

 

 

 

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