Another post about e-safety for kidsExpat Since Birth – A Life spent "abroad"a blog by a multilingual lifelong expat/international, linguist, researcher, speaker, mother of three, living in the Netherlands and writing about raising children with multiple languages, multiculturalism, parenting abroad, international life...

This is an important subject. I always cringe when I see photos of children on blogs. And I know that there are many on Facebook ( I do not use Facebook but friends have shown me ) –
I strongly believe that safety for children begins with us and with NOT posting pictures of our children on the net for all the world to see. Pictures can be exchanged privately with family and trusted friends under secure conditions behind firewalls.
When I first opened my blog I had a piece of writing where the world of children was mentioned. Among the visitors to that post (which did not have any pictures) there was a link that I checked and it turned out to be part of a network where pictures of children, and possibly of children too, were offered as if for sale. It sent chills down my spine. I reported it to the appropriate US agency and then removed that post. It alerted me to the existence of these things and how easy it can be to unwittingly expose our children to web predators. I always check the visiting links shown in the blog stats anyway, but that one time was truly an opener that taught me to pay ever more attention to this problem. Vera

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2 replies »

veraersilia says:

March 20, 2013 at 5:50 pm

This is an important subject. I always cringe when I see photos of children on blogs. And I know that there are many on Facebook ( I do not use Facebook but friends have shown me ) –
I strongly believe that safety for children begins with us and with NOT posting pictures of our children on the net for all the world to see. Pictures can be exchanged privately with family and trusted friends under secure conditions behind firewalls.
When I first opened my blog I had a piece of writing where the world of children was mentioned. Among the visitors to that post (which did not have any pictures) there was a link that I checked and it turned out to be part of a network where pictures of children, and possibly of children too, were offered as if for sale. It sent chills down my spine. I reported it to the appropriate US agency and then removed that post. It alerted me to the existence of these things and how easy it can be to unwittingly expose our children to web predators. I always check the visiting links shown in the blog stats anyway, but that one time was truly an opener that taught me to pay ever more attention to this problem. Vera

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expatsincebirth says:

March 20, 2013 at 6:12 pm

Dear Vera, thank you very much for your very precious comment! I’m also quite worried to see so many pictures of my friends’ children on blogs or on facebook etc., thinking that only their friends will be able to see them. But so can the friends of the friends… and some of these pictures are even accessible via internet. It’s very important what you say: we always have to check which pictures we set on our sites. And we shouldn’t be afraid to report inappropriate pictures! Well done!
I’m really scared about web predators, this is why I added the short films in my post “Resources about e-safety” here on my blog to make parents aware about this. To be honest, I think parents should be taught too about how to use social networks.

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