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Internet safety for kids: dangers awaiting online.

Internet safety for kids became a hot topic in the 21st century for every caring parent. Uncontrolled online activities sometimes lead to severe consequences. Safety guidelines for kids are necessary in a world where the impact of social networking is substantially growing every day.

Did you know that nearly half of young people in the world have received rude, harmful, or nasty messages while browsing online? While there are tools to use to prevent such things from happening, not everyone is familiar with them.

This is where my internet safety for kids guide steps in. After thorough research, I have come up with a plan which will enhance your child's experience while surfing the waters of this unpredictable virtual world.

Awaiting Dangers Online

First things first. Let's talk about the possible dangers that are waiting for every child in online reality

A recent study revealed that[1] cyber violence is fast becoming a global concern for governments, educational authorities, teachers, parents, and children alike.

It's a tough task for parents to control their children online, you'd say. After reading this chapter, you might change your mind. 

You will encounter some of the worst methods that online pirates are using to trick or bully children, which might change your opinion about the severity of these things.

Cyberbullying

Just like in real life, online bullying is a real threat to kids' mental and even physical health. Internet safety for kids starts with being in a peaceful environment, where bullies can't reach them.

A survey showed that at least 36% of kids in the US have suffered cyberbullying at some point in their youth. Try to walk around your neighborhood and ask fellow parents - I am sure they will have some painful experiences to share with you.

Cyberbullying could lead to severe consequences. Offensive name-calling or spreading false facts, especially when children are in school, could traumatize them.

Even many Hollywood movies are telling the same story - cyberbullying could bring a child to tears, depression, or even committing suicide. That is why internet safety for children is so important.

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Cyber-stalking

An even more-surprising danger on the internet could be cyber-stalking. While cyberbullying usually occurs between children of more or less the same age group, cyber-stalking is typically a game for adults.

When thinking about internet safety for kids, you probably wouldn't even consider it. Just listen to this: pictures that people put on Facebook carry a location tag that can be used to track any person's location. Sounds scary?

There is more.

If not protected, your child's passwords and personal information could be easily tracked online by even semi-professional hackers.

Internet safety for kids: protect your information.

If kids have public profiles on social networking sites, it would be even easier for cyber-stalkers to access all the information.

If you are reading this for the first time, I have to disappoint you. Online safety for kids in your household might be jeopardized.

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Malware or Inappropriate Websites

Suspicious websites, software, or e-mails are just as dangerous as cyber-stalkers are. Any malicious app or internet site could be manufactured by the same people that track your child via social media.

Opening a pirated website, downloading files, or torrenting from untrusted sites can be harmful to your computer. Wait, why are we talking about computers? Just because pirated files or websites not only collect personal information but also damage your computer.

Most of the time children can be too young to judge if a website or software is appropriate to use.

Internet safety for kids: children browsing online

Parents need to make sure that they use tools that ensure full internet safety for kids, but we'll review them later. There is one more possible danger.

Suspicious Meetings

As long as your family is safe at home, you're happy. However, every caring parent tends to feel worried even when your child spends a little more time with friends than agreed beforehand.

Just wonder, however, what will happen if a kid agrees to meet an online friend? Bear in mind that your loved one has never seen this virtual buddy previously.

Joyful with the opportunity to make new friends, your kid maybe isn't going to tell you about seeing a person for the first time.

This is where you should step in. You just need to keep in mind that internet pirates and stalkers can even fool your child online and take your kid out of the house. No online tools or tricks can prevent people from meeting suspicious strangers.

Internet Safety Tips For Kids

Sadly, there are things you just can't keep track of. You should encourage your child to change the way internet activities are perceived in the family.

Internet safety for kids could be ensured easier if your family simply follows my plan. Take a magnet and put these tips on a fridge, if that helps

While there are many internet safety tips for kids, I chose four main ones. They encompass all the main rules any child should follow online. 

Keep Personal Information Safe

Children might not be very creative when it comes to passwords. They would probably put their favorite pet's name in there, and that's the end of the story. 

However, it is every caring parent's responsibility to explain to your children that strong passwords work the best. Check our password generator and make sure yours is unguessable!

A mixture of lowercase and uppercase letters do wonders. A few random symbols as well. A complicated password would instead be saved in your browser's history than in some hacker's laptop.

Internet safety for kids: set up a complicated password.

That said, internet safety for kids doesn't finish with passwords. Your child's personal information could still be easily accessed if the details of social media accounts are public to everyone.

It would be useful to change personal privacy settings on all the social network accounts. That would prevent potential hackers from stealing personal data.

Do Not Respond to Mean Messages

Online bullying is another worrying aspect of internet safety for children. I highly recommend educating your children to keep away from serious conversations with their "friends".

Of course, any child has to keep away from responding to bullies online, but it is also a parents' task to keep their kid away from bullying others. Sometimes one short message can spark a severe conflict or lead to horrible consequences, which were mentioned above. 

Imagine if all parents educated their children about behaving online. This world would be a better place.

Sadly, that's never going to happen. Internet safety for kids is always a hot topic, and it is your responsibility to inform children about it.

Keep Away From Suspicious Apps or Software

There is no secret - every kid loves gaming.

But games can sometimes turn to tragedies. Especially when it comes to pirated video games.

Surely, not every parent can afford to pay the full price of a video game, which sometimes can go up to $60 or even $80.

However, what every parent can do is to ensure that children only download games from trusted sources, such as official game platforms or Android and iOs stores.

Internet safety for kids: keep away from suspicious apps.

Usually, suspicious websites that offer free games are not very trustworthy. I, on many occasions, have experienced that and even damaged my computer.

I have to confess - as a kid, I was very naive while browsing online. After downloading and installing games from a third-party website, I brought viruses to my computer, and that was the end of the story.

So now you know - this article on internet safety for kids is also designed to protect your electronics from breaking apart. A VPN could be used to avoid such issues, too.

If Anything… Tell Parents Straight Away!

Everything here leans towards talking. Talking to your children and making them talk to you usually prevents them from getting into trouble.

I could give out many internet safety tips for kids to you.

But if you don't introduce them to your family, this is all useless. 

A survey revealed[2] that the majority of teachers and clinicians are willing to teach kids about internet safety, but all groups surveyed identified parents as having primary responsibility for teaching this topic.

Posting pictures online, posting somewhat innocent comments, setting up passwords, choosing their privacy preferences - everything needs to be talked about.

If you want to keep internet safety for kids at a high level, you should talk to your kids first. It doesn't finish here - to ensure maximum privacy and security online, you will also need some useful tools.

Tools to Minimize Risks 

Disclaimer - I'm not talking here about any real-life tools to prevent any child from surfing the online world. Don't hide the internet cable in the attic just yet.

Here I will suggest some proper virtual tools to enhance your child's experience online. In this part, we're going to talk a little bit about money. If you want privacy and safety online, you'll need to pay a couple of dollars for it.

That's just how things work. Just like hiring a bodyguard to protect you.

Imagine, if you find yourself a bodyguard for free. He's probably not so well trained, nor qualified enough to protect you. He wouldn't even want to take a bullet for you. Even some paid bodyguards don't do that.

Here, though, we're talking about internet safety for kids! Their safety is even more important to you.

Use Antivirus Software

Of course, not a single computer would last more than a few weeks without antivirus software

Internet safety for kids: use antivirus software.

Virus protection software ensures your kid has a safe time downloading files or browsing the internet. This software is critical for every personal computer.

Usually, when choosing to buy a full version of the software, you'll be able to install it on a few computers at home. There are a variety of options to choose from, but, of course, paid versions do have a lot more features.

However, if you're getting antivirus software for your child, a free version could also do wonders. There are some great options available out there, and they are enough to ensure online safety for kids.

Don't worry, all the family pictures won't disappear anywhere. That's true even with a free version of the software.

Get a VPN 

Now if data protection is essential to you and your child carries a laptop to public places, a VPN is the best option to go with. You can get maximum internet safety for kids only for a couple of dollars a month!

A VPN, or a Virtual private network, ensures you are browsing the internet anonymously - hackers wouldn't even stand a chance to steal any of the personal information. A VPN hides the IP address from other users, so your activity online doesn't get exposed. It encrypts sensitive information and protects you.

You will finally be able to leave kids unattended with your laptop!

Of course, it's the same as with antivirus software - if you and your family use multiple PCs at home, you can choose to install a VPN to your router. One subscription and you're all protected!

Internet safety for kids: use a VPN.

But then again - which one should you choose? Since there are many great options, including NordVPN and ExpressVPN, you can check our list of the best VPNs out there!

I am sure you will find a VPN that suits your needs and your pocket.

Miscellaneous Tools

Speaking about additional tools to enhance internet safety for kids, there are some I have to share with you.

Probably many of you realize that possible dangers await behind some tricky ads that pop-up on the screen once you open any of your favorite websites.

Youtube has ads. Facebook has ads. Twitter has ads. Probably only Wikipedia hasn't got any ads since they adopted a no-ad policy.

Surely, your child is not going to spend time only on Wikipedia?

That's why you should have an ad-block software installed on your favorite browser. Since we are talking about online safety for kids, malicious ads can encourage them to bring viruses to the computer.

However, if you want to prevent kids from visiting certain websites, then you should set up parental controls on the PC. You either have to do it manually through your browser's settings or contact your internet service provider to help you with it.

Google's safety filter can also do great things too. If you turn it on, users won't see inappropriate content on search results.

Conclusions

To conclude, we can agree that it can be a tough task for parents to control their children online, but there tools to use and rules to follow.

No simple passwords, privacy control on social networks, and keeping away from suspicious software, messages, or websites. If only it could be that easy.

Most importantly, parents should educate their families about internet safety for children. If education doesn't work, there are always tools to minimize the risk of any danger.

There is a huge variety of different antivirus software to choose from. Of course, VPNs are the best option if you are willing to invest for maximum protection.


Scientific References

1. Ria Hanewald: 'Confronting the Pedagogical Challenge of Cyber Safety'

2. Megan A Moreno, Katie G Egan, Kaitlyn Bare, et al.: 'Internet safety education for youth: stakeholder perspectives'

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Recent User Reviews

Got hacked

I let my son use my laptop and it seems that we got hacked, I don't know what sites he accesed but seems like malware

Worried!!

Is there any way we can also block the webcam while our kids browse online? I'm worried about it

Bye social media

We decided as a family our kids won't use social media and we are using filters to block this from them, so they have a normal childhood

Just talk!

Nice article!! I think that talking to your children about internet safety is by far the most important step in keeping them safe.

Danger Online

The internet is a dangerous place for young kids and adults alike. We gotta be careful!

apps

kids just keep downloading apps on their phones but the antivirus makes their phones too slow, honestly im exhausted i dont know what to do

No guns!

I tried Google safety to help my kids stay away from violence and guns content, and thinking about the ad blockers now I don't want them to see unhealthy ads.

THE best!!!

The best solution is to explain them why is dangerous to talk to people on the internet, especially privately.

Keep an eye on them :)

If we want to really take care our children our best approach is probably just talking, and physically monitoring their internet access as much as you can.

Antivirus

Hi! Just wanted to say that most antivirus also have ad blockers and kids tools, do your research you will be grateful

protect them ! !

You all need to protect your kids from the nasty stuff on the internet. This article is a gold mine

no social media

My daughter is 12. She has a phone but is not allowed any social media accounts. Too many weirdos out there.

Whitelisting

The only reliable filtering method is a whitelist of acceptable sites. Everything else is blocked.

Google filter :D

The Google safety filter has worked wonders for my family, kids only access Google to find articles, I highly recommend

Teach them

Teach them not to take anything too seriously.

Bullying

I need a filter for the comments my kid gets on her tiktok, some are mean and I don't know how to block them so she doesn't see.

Credit card info

Is there any way to block shopping websites? My kids bought games online and I'm furious I called the company and I can't get my money back

Informative

Thank you for the tips, I would do anything to keep my children safe from the bullies and hackers.

Other activities

IMO... keeping kids super active takes care of lot of issues on their own ( soccer, swimming , gym)..

No restrictions

My wife and I don't restrict our children from anything on the Internet. We have sat our girls down and gave them the rules.

Violence filter please

Children see violence all the time and I have no idea how to block this games please help me!

My way!

all devices are kept in common areas and wifi shuts down at 9pm. This is basically the way I deal with all that Internet bullshit and prevent any issues whatsoever.

Excellent advice

I thought an antivirus was fine but I was wrong! Many ideas I will take into consideration since now on

Looks easy

My son has never had a problem online but reading horror stories about what kids see online I would like to follow steps to help prevent this

Is it safe?

I read VPNs block your IP... is this safe? Wouldn't it better to know this or is it better for kids?

Indispensable Tools

Using google chrome + Adblock plus is a start for ANY Internet user.

Thank you!

I'm afraid my kids start using the computer, every kid their age has a phone now but only God knows what they can find

Difficult era

Being a teacher, I worry the kids will access ¨bad¨ websites during class and I would like to aquire a VPN service to help

simple solution

Cyberbullying is the biggest threat on the Internet, to avoid that the best tool is talking to our childrens about the possible dangers they might encounter online and how to be smart to avoid them.

Talking is the key!

The key is to start discussing the process of online safety with your children at an early age, right when they start to do anything that involves the Internet.

Very good

Your examples are great! My little son has been bullied online and he said he was in a chat or something and I'm trying to avoid but I don't know what ads he clicked on, will use the ad blocker for sure!

Not gonna risk it

There is some seriously fucked up shit on the internet that I don't want my 8 year old to see, thank you very much for this article!

different aproach

I don't believe I CAN control the content my kids view. So I take a different approach and watch their habits and check the history.

Had no idea

I have been letting my children use internet since they were little and I didn't know I could have avoid many uncomfortable moments!

A firewall

Personally I would suggest getting a firewall, and blocking all of that kind of stuff from them.

BEST thing to do

The best thing to do is to talk to them, explain simply that people lie, ESPECIALLY online, that there are horrible things out there.

Bypassed

any software can be bypassed (i.e, a simple VPN bypasses all blocks you put in place) the best thing people can do to protect their children online is to talk to them.

Thank you! !

Thanks for the info. I do talk to my children (well, not the 6 year old yet) about all of this.

Better prevent

I'm a new mom and I don't want my daughter to see any hurtful content online. I'm trying to learn how to help her find only positive things when she starts using the computer.

Start small!

In my opinion is better to try as a parent these filters because sometimes they block too many websites

FAQ

What are the top internet dangers?

The main dangers online are cyberbullying, cyber-stalking, malware, inappropriate messages, and falling for scams. To keep your personal information and PC safe, you can always use a trusted VPN provider.

How can kids stay safe online?

There are many tools (such as VPNs ) and tips to look out for. Kids should avoid visiting malicious websites or downloading files from untrusted sources, personal information should be kept private and messages from strangers should be completely ignored.

How do you decide which provider offers the best VPN?

Deciding which provider has the top VPN is not an easy task, but it sure is fun! We have a dedicated team of professionals who test each VPN from start to finish, measuring all of the most important features. We buy all the VPNs ourselves, use machine learning & data science algorithms, get opinions from hundreds of real users, MIT professors, internet security experts and more. The top VPN services are decided by measuring all these important metrics, and never by the request of the providers.

Is VPN legal & safe?

VPNs are totally legal, well, at least in 97% of the world. Some countries only allow government-approved VPNs, like: China, Iran, Oman, Russia, Turkey & United Arab Emirates.
Nonetheless, it’s completely legal in most countries. Usually, top VPN providers are really safe too, but to make sure, look for the information logging & DNS leak topics in our best VPN reviews. If the provider of your interest logs your personal data & doesn’t pass the DNS leakage test, you should look for a more safer VPN.

What are the benefits of using a VPN?

What top VPNs do is mask your real IP address to hide your current location. If the VPN has great quality, it won’t leak or log your personal information. You can freely roam around the internet not having to worry about the exposure of your privacy and information. Also, you can access geo-blocked content on Netflix, or other censored types of information. A VPN can also give you an extra layer of safety for Peer-to-Peer sharing function while using torrents. Every VPN has different pros and cons, so be sure to check them in our in-depth best VPN reviews.

Can VPNs be used to unblock content?

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