Should parents supervise, or even spy on, their children’s mobiles, computers and tablets?
Experts use the term “active parental mediation” to refer to what in every home is known as “being aware of what the child is doing”
The coordinator of the Spanish Security Center for Children on the Internet, Manuel Ransán, advises parents to support “parental control tools and content filtering: assign an age range that limits access, or restricts the use of the webcam “. We are facing a complex issue, even if it is completely normal, which goes beyond if it is ethical or not to spy on children. It involves the use of personal data owned by others, a legislation issue and to a certain extent, subject to interpretation. As stated in the European Charter of the Rights of Children and in the Constitution itself, the legal guardians of minors have the obligation to ensure their safety and to exercise parental authority, also accessing their communications when their safety is at risk.
Are there risks on the Net?
Yes. But, on the other hand, minors also have the right to privacy and the secrecy of communications, according to the aforementioned rules, which specify that their consent to access their messages and contents would be necessary provided that their degree of maturity is sufficient. The Data Protection Law that determines when a minor is mature: at 14 years of age.
Experts use the term “active parental mediation” to refer to what in every home is known as “being aware of what the child is doing”.
“You do not need to spy on them or be an expert to know what applications they use, with whom they speak or to what content they access. We can ask something, but the best way to supervise them is to share activities with them”, says Ransán, an expert. “It’s not a bad tactic to behave in a way as if you do not know what you are doing: how do you have your privacy set? Can you help me set up mine? What YouTubers do you like? Look, I like this one. Do you know if there is a page where you can make new friends? My friend says she wants to lose weight. Have you seen a page for advice for her?”
But although good control is effective, it is also necessary to set limits. The experts call this part: restrictive mediation.
In the first place, says Ransán, “we must establish limits to control the abusive use of these devices if we do not want our children to become junkies of the screens”. And when we let them use them, “lean on parental control tools and content filtering: assign an age range that limits access, block contents of a sexual or violent nature, or that talk about drugs, allow the device to be used only at certain times, restrict the use of the webcam, monitor the activity, block possible contact with certain numbers … “.
‘Grooming’: sexual harassers in the network
“The most common danger faced by children who surf the net is, first of all, the harmful content: violence, pornography, anorexia, bulimia … But also exposure to unwanted contacts, whose sole purpose is to create a bond with the child to obtain their own satisfaction”, explains Ransán. This is precisely the ‘grooming’: adults who act deliberately to establish bonds of friendship with children, gain their trust and get them to send photos and even planning meetings.
It is very difficult to identify these stalkers because in most cases they use false profiles, so it is important that parents use active mediation to know how a ‘virtual person’ has contacted their children. It is hard to keep control with so many applications such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and other applications.
The expert in cybersecurity refers in particular to a new social network, “ThisCrush”, very fashionable among young people between 12 and 20 years, which allows you to connect with others anonymously, without identifying them through any type of profile. “There are more and more cases of harassment, insults, derogatory comments …”
Cyberbullying to minors
This is another of the great risks of the Internet, the use that minors make of platforms and social networks to harm others of the same age: cyberbullying. If the harasser is under 16 years of age, it is the legal guardians who are responsible for this crime, with an economic punishment that varies according to the severity. If they are over 16 years of age, they are subject to criminal liability.
If the child develops these dynamics in social networks, it is common for them to react it in real life. Therefore, it is crucial that parents make an overall observation of the children’s behaviour. It is true that technology has come to stay, and that it has arrived so quickly that we have not stopped to reflect on the implications it entails. As it happens with everything, first we do it and then afterwards we reflect on good practices.
“At the moment,” he concludes, “what parents should do is encourage critical thinking, let them know that not everything on the Internet is good, that not all people are who they say they are and that everything recorded in the cloud can have negative repercussions in his future impossible to predict “.