Digital Security Resources for Parents

Internet Safety 101 site: Enough Is Enough® understands that Internet safety is a shared responsibility between the public, the Internet industry, and the legal community. However, parents remain the 'first line of defense' in protecting their children against Internet safety dangers. Unfortunately, parents, educators and other caring adults are ill-equipped, uninformed and often overwhelmed when it comes to Internet safety issues, and they need credible outside help. As the nation's leading Internet safety organization since 1994, EIE has responded to this call for action by creating Internet Safety 101SM, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice. Internet Safety 101SM is a widely-renowned resource and teaching series that paints a comprehensive picture of the dangers children encounter online. Through the Internet Safety 101SM program, EIE strives to educate and empower parents, educators and other caring adults with the information they need to effectively protect children from Internet dangers.

 Link: https://internetsafety101.org/parentsguidetosocialmedia

A Parent's Guide to SmartPhone Security: with this guide you can make your smartphone safer for your kids in just 11 easy steps. 

Link: https://internetsafety101.org/objects/Parents_Guide_to_Smart_Phone_Security.pdf

FBI Parents Resources: Get advice and information to help protect your children from dangers lurking in both the online and offline worlds.  

• About Protecting Your Kids: Learn how to Contact The FBI; Report child abductions or abuse
• FBI Child ID App: The FBI's Child ID App provides parents with an easy way to electronically store their children’s information and identity.
• Get advice and information to help protect your children from dangers lurking in both the online and offline worlds.

Link: https://www.fbi.gov/resources/parents

KidsHealth - Internet Safety Guide: The Internet can be wonderful for kids. They can use it to research school reports, communicate with teachers and other kids, and play interactive games.
But online access also comes with risks, like inappropriate content, cyberbullying, and online predators. Using apps and websites where kids interact, predators may pose as a child or teen looking to make a new friend. They might prod the child to exchange personal information, such as address and phone number, or encourage kids to call them, seeing their phone number via caller ID.

Link: https://kidshealth.org/en/parents/net-safety.html

Family Online Safety Institute (FOSI): Need help talking with your kids about online safety? Want to know about parental controls? Looking for a simple set of rules to use with your children? FOSI’s Good Digital Parenting provides you with videos, tip sheets, resources, blogs, and more.

Link: https://www.fosi.org/good-digital-parenting/

National Cyber Security Alliance/Stay Safe Online: Here are helpful links from the National Cyber Security Alliance's sponsors, partners and friends to help you and your friends and family be safer and more secure online.

Link: https://staysafeonline.org/stay-safe-online/related-links/

Tom's Guide: Best Parental Control Apps 2019: The best parental-control apps for smartphones can help you track your kids, see whom they are communicating with, block kids from viewing objectionable or dangerous websites, and even help kids understand the value of limits while preventing them from accessing adult content or communicating with strangers.

Link: https://www.tomsguide.com/us/best-parental-control-apps,review-2258.html

PCMag.com - The Best Tracking Devices for Kids: Kids get lost. GPS and Bluetooth trackers can help find them and keep them safe. With the help of our own children, we've tested clips, smartwatches, and wearables to determine what type works best and which one is right for you.

Link: https://www.pcmag.com/roundup/362044/the-best-tracking-devices-for-kids

OpenDNS - Basic Web Filtering and Protection: OpenDNS is the name of a Domain Name System (DNS) service as well as of the company that provides that service. The OpenDNS service extends the DNS by incorporating features such as content filtering and phishing protection.  Get OpenDNS Family Shield

Link: https://www.opendns.com/setupguide/#familyshield

Geek Squad Has A Great Video on 5 Tips to Protect Your Kids Online

Just a quick post:  From homework to video games, school-aged children are connected to the online world now more than ever. In this 2 Minute Miracle video Geek Squad Agents Josh Musicant and Eric Irish offer five simple tips to protect your children online.  They cover the following tips:




1.  Use a trusted filtering software software: Cyber Patrol, Norton, and Spysweeper
2.  Maximize your current software.  MS Windows and MAC OS controls.
3.  Use of your wireless router.  Blocking websites and protecting the Access Point
4.  Controlling what kids access via online gaming by using the rating system.
5.  Social networking.  Keep the computer in a place where you can watch your kids online.


I posted a guide to protect your kids online HERE.

Talk to Your Neighbors About Their Open Wireless Access Point

I've run into this several times; We've done all we can to secure our Wireless Access Point, we've added WEP or WPA, setup MAC address restrictions, etc., only to be circumvented by the fact that our neighbor's Access Point is wide open.  There are a couple of reasons for this:

• Some folks don't care. 
• They like wide open access, it\'s easy and they want to offer the world their internet connection. 
• They don't know how to secure it. 
• I'm sure that this is the most common problem. 
• It's just too confusing, difficult, etc..
• They have other intentions. 

A little known fact is that once a computer accesses the inside of someone's network, it becomes vulnerable to whatever is happening on that network. The traffic from all machines can be captured, operating system vulnerabilities can be exploited, and your kids (or you) can become targeted by them.  The most significant problem is that your kids are not using the infrastructure you should be providing.  You've secured yours, you've locked it down, and you control it.  - They are basically "sneaking" out the window at night - using a window that someone else provided.

What should you do?

• You should find your neighbors wireless access points yourself, and talk to them about the open ones you've found.  If you have a hard time figuring out who they are, you can detect it yourself with a number of tools. One in particular is NetStumbler which can be used to scan your immediate area. With NetStumbler, you can get a signal strength meter - the stronger the signal, the closer you are.  Just use it to find the open access points..  
• Look at your kids computers, and the wireless preferences, most of the time you'll see profiles for wireless points they've accessed.  If some of these match up with the ones you found in the neighborhood, it's time for a conversation.  
• Remind your kids to use the internet connection you've provided. If you suspect that they are still using your neighbors connection; speak with your neighbor and let them know that their connection is being used and by whom. You probably would want to highly encourage them to secure the point.  

It pays to know what's going on in you neighborhood. Who's providing points of interest for your kids.  It's kind of an electronic neighborhood watch

The FBI's Security Guide for Protecting Children Online

The FBI has put together an excellent resource for protecting your children on-line.  This guide is written for parents and it contains an excellent analysis of how to tell if your kid is doing something on-line that they should not be doing and what to do if you find out.  In summary, they want parents to know:
The signs your child may be at risk to on-line threats:

• Your child spends large amounts of time on-line, especially at night.
• You find pornography on your child’s computer.
• Your child receives phone calls from men you don’t know or is making calls, sometimes long distance, to numbers you don’t recognize
• Your child receives mail, gifts, or packages from someone you don’t know.
• Your child turns the computer monitor off or quickly changes the screen on the monitor when you come into the room.
• Your child becomes withdrawn from the family.
• Your child is using an on-line account belonging to someone else.

Click Here for the guide.