Internet seems to be quite a friendly place filled with cat videos and funny pictures. It is also very reliable source of information, however often used too often. But the truth is not always so bright. Internet is also full of adult material containing brutal violence or sexual intercourse which is highly inappropriate for minors. And children are actually the group of population that is browsing the internet most often, which makes them vulnerable to such materials. Inappropriate content is one thing. Another problem is when children are spending too much time vacantly surfing on the Web or playing video games. The latter one is especially time consuming and unproductive.

Awareness is fundamental

What exactly can we do to prevent any harm to both our children and the computer during their activity on the Internet? There are few steps to consider. First of all, we should aware them about the dangers of the Web and how they should behave and what they need to avoid to not getting into any trouble. For example, we can teach them about using privacy settings on the websites like Facebook or Google Plus, so they will not share more of their private information and photos than necessary. Another thing is informing them, that entering websites which contain adult materials can cause a serious damage to their computer, because such websites often contain also malicious programs or viruses that are downloaded and installed automatically. This argument should halt their curiosity, especially if they are playing video games a lot.

Using helpful software

Speaking of which, if any arguments that your child should play less video games and do the homework are not working, you can install one of the many parental control monitoring programs, which are available online. They have very useful options that can help you set the rules about using the computer and Internet. First of all, you can set a black list of websites that will not be available to visit. Also, you can use word filters that will prevent search engines from displaying undesirable results. And what is probably the most interesting and useful feature, you will be able to set time limits how often certain computer can be used. What is interesting, many companies and public facilities are using software with similar options to parental controls, to ensure that their employees won’t waste time on the Internet during work hours.

Protect your computer too!

Last thing that should be taken into consideration is installing anti-virus and anti-malware programs. Even if you or your children will not browse porn websites, malicious programs and viruses can be downloaded unintentionally even when exploring suspicious sites. Also, such programs can come to you through the e-mail messages. Protecting your computer from the internet threats is almost as important as keeping your child safe, because you can eventually loose everything you store on your hard drive or even passwords for bank account.

Summary

To sum it up, Internet can be very useful tool for both education and entertainment. However, we should be aware of the dangers that wait for us and our children out.

Photo by Nicolas Demars from FreeImages