How to Monitor Youth Online Activity

The internet is a great place to do many things. You can conduct research, chat with family and friends, write and post articles, buy and sell items to name a few. All of this can be done by both adults and children. The internet has opened a new world for everyone. Unfortunately, the internet can also be a dangerous ‘place’ for children, especially with the online chatting and social networks that exist. It is important for parents to be aware of the dangers and to take the necessary steps to ensure children have a good and safe experience using the internet. This article will provide you with a few steps to help you monitor children online activity.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Computer monitoring software

1. 

   First, install computer monitoring software on your computer. There are many computer monitoring software packages available. Determine what is important to you and find a computer monitoring software that will meet your needs. Is online chatting the only concern. Or is online chatting and social websites. The computer monitoring software packages offer many features some of which are monitoring emails, online chatting, social website postings.

2. 

   Second, set up the computer monitoring software to run in the background all the time. What this does is the software will be ‘on’ anytime the computer is being used. The computer monitoring software will capture all of the online activity that appears on the screen. This information will be saved to a file for you to see. Each computer monitoring software will offer different features such as capturing screen images, recording log-in and passwords, capturing inappropriate language. The computer monitoring software is hidden on the computer making it difficult to be located by any user.

3. Third, set up time to review the computer monitoring software output. Review the online activity. Determine if there is any inappropriate language in emails or on chat rooms, inappropriate pictures on social websites. Some of this may not be your own child's activity but others that are part of the ‘friends network’. The popularity of having many ‘friends’ can result in having someone that acts inappropriately when online.

4. 

   Finally, have frequent conversations with your children about online activity. Make it known that computers track what everyone does online and the activity they perform online is being recorded. Whether it is your own computer or the computers that store all of the pictures on the social websites. Everything that is written and posted is recorded somewhere. Let your children know the internet is a great and wonderful tool to use but it should be used appropriately.

Tips & Warnings

• Ask others what type of computer monitoring software they use.
• Be open and honest about tracking online activity. This is as much about keeping children safe as well as helping to make the internet a safe and fun place.
• Know your local officials to contact if you uncover inappropriate activity that needs to be reported.

Resources

• Spectorsoft
• Computer Monitoring
• Soft Activity
• Spytech-Web.com
• PCtattletale