Safe and Secure

How Facebook fights child porn

It's hard not to be affected by an article titled "Kids Raped, Sodomized on Facebook Pages," the first of a four-part WND series about child porn and Facebook.

The article alleges that the blog "located dozens of child porn images after 'friending' many likely pedophiles and predators who trade thousands of pornographic photos on the social network."

Unlike legal "adult pornography," child porn depicts sexual exploitation of children, in some cases very young children. Child porn is illegal in the United States and many other countries. Anyone who knowingly produces, transmits, stores, or possesses child porn could face a more

California AG Kamala Harris on app privacy deal (podcast)

California Attorney General Kamala Harris announced a mobile app privacy agreement today with Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Hewlett-Packard, and Research In Motion.

The agreement with the companies whose platforms and app stores collectively dominate the mobile app universe, is designed to bring the mobile app industry into compliance with California's existing law that requires companies that collect personal information to have a published privacy policy.

The announcement comes in the wake of several reports of companies uploading user data, sometimes without informing the user or getting permission.

Last week the Federal Trade Commission released a report titled "Mobile Apps more

FTC: Mobile apps for kids lack privacy disclosures

In a report released today, the FTC said that when it comes to mobile applications aimed at kids there is "little, if any, information in the app marketplaces about the data collection and sharing practices of these apps."

The Federal Trade Commission said that its staff searched the Apple and Android app stores for apps using the word "kids," and "encountered a diverse pool of apps for kids created by hundreds of different developers," but that privacy disclosure was lacking.

The report, titled Mobile Apps for Kids: Current Privacy Disclosures are Disappointing (PDF), focused on disclosures to users more

Safer Internet Day focuses on Net safety for families

You don't hear much about it in the United States, but today is Safer Internet Day across Europe, with some events planned in Asia, Latin America, Australia, and the United States.

The annual event started in 2004 as an initiative of the European Commission's Safer Internet Programme. It features school assemblies and major conferences in many countries.

I'm in Moscow to speak at Russia's Safer Internet Day conference. Several members of Russia's parliament, along with other government officials, are expected to participate along with educators, Moscow area schoolchildren and representatives of technology companies including Google more

Mostly good news about kids online, study finds

A report from the University of New Hampshire's Crimes against Children Research Center shows a significant decrease in "unwanted online sexual solicitation" as well as "unwanted exposure to pornography" in recent years among children ages 10 to 17 years old. There was a small increase in online harassment.

Nine percent of respondents reported getting an unwanted sexual solicitation in 2010, compared with 13 percent in 2005 and 19 percent in 2000 -- a steady decrease. The percentage of youth who reported an unwanted exposure to pornography was 23 percent in 2010, down from 34 percent in 2005. It was more

Facebook throws potentially suicidal users a Lifeline

Facebook announced today that it's working with the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on a program designed to help save lives.

The new service will enable Facebook users to click on a link and be taken to a page where they can enter into a live chat with a suicide prevention specialist. There is also a reporting link where users can alert Facebook, if they see something on a person's profile that causes them to think that the person is in severe distress. Facebook will send a message to that person to encourage them to contact the Lifeline.

The more

Man behind XXX domains says they'll help parents protect kids

After years of being debated by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), .XXX was approved earlier this year and is now a reality. Approximately 100,000 XXX domains are going live on Tuesday.

The new top level domains (TLD) are not without controversy. Some free speech advocates worry that there will be governments that require the use of XXX for adult content, effectively forcing such sites into a virtual red-light district but others, including some religious groups, worry that it will legitimize or even sanction pornography.

Stuart Lawley, the founder and CEO of ICM Registry, the company more

Sexting far less prevalent than previously reported

A study published in the January, 2012 issue of Pediatrics asked teens whether they had sent or received sexually suggestive, nude or nearly nude images of themselves--a practice commonly known as "sexting."

What they found is that 2.5 percent of the 10- to 17-year-olds in the survey said they had appeared in or created images that depicted themselves nude or nearly nude. But, when the researchers asked if the images "showed breasts, genitals or someone's bottom," only 1.3 percent said they had appeared in or created such images. The "nude or nearly nude" category included youth wearing

Most kids who break 'Internet house rules' have bad experiences

A 24-country study conducted by Symantec found that 82 percent of kids who've broken "Internet house rules" have experienced something negative online." That compares to 52 percent of kids who "follow house rules."

More than six in 10 (62 percent) of kids reported that they have had a negative experience while online. Those negative experiences include being bullied, responding to an e-mail scam, downloading a virus, or being pressured online to do something that the child thought was wrong.

Cyberbaiting
The study also found that a fifth of teachers (21 percent) have personally experienced or know another teacher who'more

Online bullying: Still way less common than in real life

A new study entitled Teens, Kindness and Cruelty on Social Networks confirms much of what we already know about cyberbullying. Most kids aren't bullied and most kids don't bully either online or off.

In fact, the study--conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project for the Family Online Safety Institute and Cable in the Classroom--concluded that "[m]ost American teens who use social media say that in their experience, people their age are mostly kind to one another on social network sites." Nearly seven in ten (69 percent) of teens said that peers are mostly kind while 20 more