The internet provides young people with an affluence of opportunities for their entertainment, communication and education. But it has also been proved dangerous for your child thus it is important for parents to keep watch on every activity their child performs online.

To keep your child safe, it’s important that you have an understanding of the internet on how your child uses it and the terminology used online. You can even ask your child to help or teach you how it works.

Similarly, parents should also be understanding, calm and friendly with their children. So the children can open up to them, particularly, if they are in any sort of trouble or have caused some disturbance online.

Parents should at least try talking things out with their children compassionately and be very considerate with them that they even start revealing their secrets willingly.

Some common risks online

–Becoming a victim of online bullying (cyber bullying)

-Sharing personal and giving personal information to strangers such as; home address or telephone numbers.

-Being manipulated by an adult for sexual purposes.

-Seeing disturbing images, receiving obscene and pornography films or messages of themselves or others, known as sex-ting from mobiles.

-Meeting and getting friendly with misleading people online who are themselves engaged in illicit activities.

-Starting online relationships with strangers that can sometimes lead to abuse or suicide.

How to keep your child safe

-Take some time and talk to your children politely about the dangers caused by the internet.

-Put the computer in a place where the whole family can watch over their activities, as in the living room.

-Use filtering software to block inappropriate/ adult sites.

-Understand what your child does online, or which website they visit often. Ask them about it gently.

– Explain that anything shared online or by mobile phone could end up being seen by anyone, so to be very alert and careful.

– Ask them to talk to you when they become worried or concerned over some issue.

-Tell them to not waste much time over social networking sites or chatting, and search more on educational sites as internet has a wide range of educational sources like wikipedia.

-Check internet history of your children when they are unaware or out of the house, then if you find anything wrong, discuss about it indirectly with vivid examples.

-Lastly, encourage your child to use websites where they can find advice and guidance on safe, also fun use of the internet.