We carelessly update everything about us on the phone, we let our kids download various apps and update our whereabouts on social networking sites without even thinking once about who is watching us.
The biggest enemy to fight with today is the cyber crime and it’s the child who is most affected by it.
The Mango Education group organised a session on cyber crime and how kids are affected by it. The session was conducted at Orange Sprouts by Ms Manjula Narsimhan Director - Compliance & Customer Support at KGISL along with being a CISA Certified Information Security Professional.
She awakened the audience with the kind of unknown blunders we make and forfeit the security of our child.
“You should never update 3 crucial information about yourself together, that is your full name, date of birth and phone number, it is enough to track your movement by the minute for a tracker.” as quoted by Ms Manjula.
According to her children become victims of cyber crime when parents don’t share a comfort zone with children, the child fears to express what he is going through or if someone is taking an advantage of him.
It is very easy to give a phone and laptop to your child, but it is very important to educate them about the ills of internet and what kind of crimes that happen over the net.
Every app downloaded could be malware that can track and reveal information about you to the public, pictures that are uploaded on the phone of the child are extensively used for child pornography, the geomapping sites know where you are at what time and where you are heading next.
Sometimes it’s spooky but your phone is a spy that reveals even the smallest and minute information about you in seconds.
Therefore according to her it is important that we secure our phone with a password and let the child use a phone only under parental guidance.
Avoid handing a child a smart phone and if it the child has a smart phone, monitor the phone and the child’s behaviour because he can anytime be a victim of cyber bullying.
Explain the child why not to add any strangers on social networking sites and how not to be mislead.
Internet is a great serving tool for information but remember it is also passing your personal information too, so keep a tab on what apps you use, what privacy settings to make and most importantly not to ignore what keeps your child busy on the internet.