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KEEP KIDS SAFE ONLINE:
Exposure to adult material

Bulletin boards and websites with adult material pose a different threat. Most are commercial enterprises that require a fee, and most do not want hassles with angry parents. But the World Wide Web is global, which means that objectionable material can come from virtually anywhere.

The online industry has pledged to do more to help parents, and there is a good possibility that manufacturers will install special filtering software on all new computers.
Here are some popular filtering programs:

Net Nanny http://www.netnanny.com/

CyberPatrol http://www.cyberpatrol.com

SurfWatch http://www.spyglass.com/products/surfwatch

We do not endorse any of these products, but we simply offer them for you to investigate.Commercial products available now promise parents that they can easily block access to X-rated sites.

Yet there is no quick fix, and the existing technology is far from perfect. On the one hand, objectionable sites can still squeak through, while worthwhile sites are blocked. Breast cancer support groups, for example, have found themselves banned because the software "spiders" through sites to find target words, such as breast, which trigger an automatic lockout.
  1. Solving the Puzzle
  2. Problems With Chat
  3. Exposure to Adult Material
  4. Traffic in Child Pornography
  5. Different Ages, Different Problems
  6. Communication & Supervision
  7. My Rules for Online Safety


Troubling for parents as well is the explosion in "porn spam." (Spam is the term for unsolicited bulk email advertising, in this case from companies offering adult material.) The come-ons themselves can be offensive, and kids may be no more than one click away from material that you might not want them to see.

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last updated by David Clarke on 1 Mar 2001
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