Shield your children against cyber crime
BEFORE buying that cellphone as a Christmas gift for your child, be prepared to deal with the dark side of this technology.
Apart from cyber bullying, you might be exposing your child to dangerous strangers or stalkers in chat rooms.
Like any other parent, I worry about the possibility of my daughter gaining access to adult material.
Early in the year some of us received unsolicited video image of two youths, in school uniform, having sex while a friend was recording the event before circulating it.
We also read about a "Facebook rapist". Thabo Bester was dubbed the "Facebook rapist" because he used social media to lure women throughout the country. He told them international modelling scouts were interested in them. He would then arrange to meet them in person. He would then allegedly rape and rob them at knife-point. Bester was arrested in Alberton, south of Johannesburg. He appeared in the Cape Town magistrate's court on Thursday, charged with murdering 26-year-old model Nomfundo Tyulu in a Sunset Beach B&B in Cape Town in September.
Wireless Application Service Providers' Association (WASPA) chairman Leon Perlman says a cellphone is a blessing for the young ones who want to keep in touch with their friends or to plan social gatherings. But it is equally a challenge for parents if not managed correctly.
Perlman says being a parent in this century is a frightening challenge since we do not know how to deal with the dark side of this exploding technology.
He says parents find themselves battling with a wide variety of cellphone-related issues from the day their children start owning one.
"Cellphones are an unavoidable part of modern culture. Parents soon feel pressured to provide their children with one, though the reasons for this might vary."
He says pressure might be driven by a concern for the child's safety, as a means of enabling them to fit in with their peers or to provide the child with a means of learning how to budget.
"Whatever your reason for wanting your child to have access to a cellphone, the fact remains that there is a downside to such ownership," he says.
Perlman says there are monetary concerns around premium-rated services as well. He urged parents to educate their children to prevent cyber-bullying or chances of meeting strangers in chat rooms or social networks in general.
"Most parents would feel more secure if they had some level of control over the content the child sees.
"Blocking children from browsing adult sites or disabling the internet on a phone is not enough," Perlman says.
The dark side of cellphones
Shield your children against cyber crime
BEFORE buying that cellphone as a Christmas gift for your child, be prepared to deal with the dark side of this technology.
Apart from cyber bullying, you might be exposing your child to dangerous strangers or stalkers in chat rooms.
Like any other parent, I worry about the possibility of my daughter gaining access to adult material.
Early in the year some of us received unsolicited video image of two youths, in school uniform, having sex while a friend was recording the event before circulating it.
We also read about a "Facebook rapist". Thabo Bester was dubbed the "Facebook rapist" because he used social media to lure women throughout the country. He told them international modelling scouts were interested in them. He would then arrange to meet them in person. He would then allegedly rape and rob them at knife-point. Bester was arrested in Alberton, south of Johannesburg. He appeared in the Cape Town magistrate's court on Thursday, charged with murdering 26-year-old model Nomfundo Tyulu in a Sunset Beach B&B in Cape Town in September.
Wireless Application Service Providers' Association (WASPA) chairman Leon Perlman says a cellphone is a blessing for the young ones who want to keep in touch with their friends or to plan social gatherings. But it is equally a challenge for parents if not managed correctly.
Perlman says being a parent in this century is a frightening challenge since we do not know how to deal with the dark side of this exploding technology.
He says parents find themselves battling with a wide variety of cellphone-related issues from the day their children start owning one.
"Cellphones are an unavoidable part of modern culture. Parents soon feel pressured to provide their children with one, though the reasons for this might vary."
He says pressure might be driven by a concern for the child's safety, as a means of enabling them to fit in with their peers or to provide the child with a means of learning how to budget.
"Whatever your reason for wanting your child to have access to a cellphone, the fact remains that there is a downside to such ownership," he says.
Perlman says there are monetary concerns around premium-rated services as well. He urged parents to educate their children to prevent cyber-bullying or chances of meeting strangers in chat rooms or social networks in general.
"Most parents would feel more secure if they had some level of control over the content the child sees.
"Blocking children from browsing adult sites or disabling the internet on a phone is not enough," Perlman says.
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