Get this document online at http://www.datamaster.ca/InternetSafetyTips

Internet & Email in General

View Internet Explorer History:

From the “Tools” button: Toolbars\History.

In Internet Explorer’s Tools\Internet Options there is a single button to clean up all history of where you have gone on the internet. Norton Internet Security adds a button to Internet Explorer’s toolbar to make this even easier.

phishing: When you are mis-lead into thinking someone is not who they are.

-Never respond to emails that request personal financial information

-Visit banks' websites by typing the URL into the address bar, not from email messages.

-when banking, check that the website you are visiting is secure

Check the web address in the address bar. If the website you are visiting is on a secure server it should start with "https://" ("s" for security) rather than the usual "http://". Also look for a lock icon on the browser's status bar.

Popups: Never click the “OK” or “Cancel” buttons on them if you can, always use the topmost right “X” button (newer popups will have “X close”)

Never respond to any spam messages or click on any links in the message

Replying to any spam message, even to "unsubscribe" or be "removed" from the email list only confirms to the spammer that you are a valid recipient and a perfect target for future spamming.
Do you doubt the claims of an email? Check out http://www.snopes.com/ they’ve done the research to find out if it’s true or not.

When sending email messages to a large number of recipients, use the blind copy (BCC) field to conceal their email addresses

Sending email where all recipient addresses are "exposed" in the "To" field makes it vulnerable to harvesting by a spammer's traps.

Never give your primary email address to anyone or any site you don't trust

Share it only with your close friends and business colleagues.

Have and use one or two secondary email addresses

If you need to fill out web registration forms, or surveys at sites from which you don't want to receive further information, consider using secondary addresses to protect primary email accounts from spam abuse. Also, always look for a box that solicits future information/offers, and be sure to select or deselect as appropriate.

CBC radio podcast about a parent who is a computer guru yet her 12 year old daughter was getting on her computer at 3:00am chatting with older people and downloading pornography. She talks about how schools should be filtering the Internet at school.

http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/slc_20080416_5384.mp3

http://www.facebook.com

http://www.sophos.com/security/topic/facebook.html (has pod-cast of how your identity can be stolen using information on facebook)

http://podcasts.sophos.com/en/sophos-podcasts-019.mp3

web page of “best practices” for using facebook

http://www.sophos.com/security/best-practice/facebook.html

Don’t post pictures and stories about how you have acted poorly (drinking & parting, etc). This could be viewed by companies you might be applying for a job with. When you are going on vacation, burglars know when you are away so they can rob your house. New features can even give people a minute by minute update as to where you are using GPS phones.

Don’t make your passwords something about your home life, kids name, home town, phone #, etc… they are easy to guess.

Strangers may be posing as you in order to talk to your family and friends so that they can get info from them and not necessarily about you.

“seven degrees of separation” means you are that close to the bad people as well as friends.

What are friends posting about you, pictures etc. You can not remove them yourself, you’ll have to ask that person to take down the picture. They may “Tag” you and others so that you can be identified in the pictures.

Remember to block anyone that is sending unwanted messages, etc.

Facebook’s page on safety: http://www.facebook.com/help.php?safety

Facebook allows you to file complaints about nudity or pornography, or harassment or unwelcome contact are made by sending an email to abuse@facebook.com

http://apps.facebook.com/thesearemykids/welcome

allows you to privately share pictures, diaries, etc on Facebook by specifically inviting only the people you want to.

Do go into the “Privacy” settings and review what you want people to see. Be aware that the menu items look like this:

http://www.MySpace.com

MySpace is similar to Facebook but has been around much longer. They have recently added privacy settings to help protect people.

Here’s a link to a program that helps to protect you kids when they use MySpace:

http://www.ikeepsafe.org/parentcare/index.php

MSN Messenger

MSN, as it is usually called, is a chatting program that allows people to send messages back and forth quickly. You can chat with a single person or many at one time. It is typical of kids to have many windows on the computer open and be jumping back and forth between them typing messages to each other. They can also send each other files; pictures, videos, music, etc…MSN has the built-in ability to be a telephone (if you have a microphone) or to use a webcam for video chatting. With webcams you can not tell what the person(s) on the other end are doing with their view of the video. They could be capturing the video completely or just snapshots.

MSN can be used to play games with other people (that have chat windows associated with them).

By using the built-in Windows “Remote Asistance” you can invite someone on another computer to take control of yours.

MSN also has a quick like to “Kids Help Phone” !

Microsoft’s website for help with privacy: http://www.microsoft.com/protect/default.mspx

Features of MSN Messenger

- “remember me”

- “remember password”

- There is no way to keep the settings they way you want them for your child, they can go in and change them afterwards.

- MSN can create a “Sharing folder” between you and a someone in your contact list.

- Can chat with a Webcam. Allows for video conversations, etc.

In Tools\Options\Messages section:

- Message History area > “Automatically Keep a history of my conversations” and “Save my conversations in this folder”. Use these 2 settings to save all chats in a file.

- files can be sent from one person to another using MSN. Make sure in the “File Transfer area you have “Scan files for viruses using:” checked on and you anti-virus program is set here.

- “Privacy” settings contains list of all their contact and ones that are blocked from sending message to your MSN account.

- “Privacy” settings also has a button to view everyone who has this child on their contact list.

- “Security” settings allow for saving your password, address book, etc.

*Remember that you child may change these settings at any time. They use the settings are all the time to give themselves cool code names and say what they are doing.

Windows Live OneCare

http://get.live.com/familysafety/overview

http://www.microsoft.com/protect/products/family/onecarefamilysafety.mspx

Safer browsing with Web site management

Help protect your kids from the online stuff you don't want them to see by filtering the Web sites they visit.

Safer e-mail, IM, and blogging with contact management

Built-in contact approval helps you know who your kids are talking to on IM, e-mail, or their blogs. You can approve or reject each new contact for their Windows Live Messenger, Hotmail and Spaces.

Professional guidance to help you decide

We provide age-specific default settings based on the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics and other trusted sources. You can adjust these settings to fit your own children and values.

Stay informed, from almost any PC connected to the Internet

Whether you’re at work or on the road, you can access your children's safety settings from almost any Web-connected PC.

LimeWire, BitTorrent, Morpheus

These programs are file sharing programs used by kids to download music for free. These programs can also download ANY type of file: pictures, movies, programs, etc… Newer versions of these programs may be able to filter content but it may not be setup in the beginning. So besides downloading illegal music, they can also get to pictures, movies, pornography, etc…

These programs will download the files onto your computer. If they are deleted by your child you could find it in the Recycle Bin. The Recycle Bin can easily be cleaned out. It can also be “skipped” by holding down the Shift Key while deleting the file. Programs like Norton SystemWorks will have programs that can “rescue” a file that has been deleted and even cleared from the Recycle Bin.

http://www.YouTube.com

YouTube & Google Video (Google bought YouTube) are websites that allow anyone to upload any video they want. In the news lately there has been a story of kids posting videos of kids “trashing” First Nations people, kids bullying other kids, etc. It’s pretty wide open. There aren’t any sex videos as they try to monitor what is posted but some can be inappropriate for kids.

General tips

Put your computer in the living room or other room where you can see what it going on with it.
Install Internet Explorer 7 and turn on phishing & popup blocking.
Install an anti-virus program and an anti-spyware program
Install K9 web filtering program (or something similar) to protect browsing to undesirable websites. (Or turn on Internet Explorer’s Web Content filtering – http://www.wikihow.com/Restrict-Web-Browsing-Using-Internet-Explorer)
review online rules with your kids: (http://safety.sympatico.msn.ca/children/staysafe.aspx)

Rule 1: Keep your personal information to yourself.

Rule 2: People may not be who they say they are.

Rule 3: Don't open attachments from strangers.

Rule 4: Tell an adult you trust if something online makes you feel uncomfortable. (including bullying)

Rule 5: Meeting online strangers alone is dangerous.

Cyberbullying is unacceptable.
Gaming consoles like Xbox can also have Internet access and chat programs
Limit the amount of time your child can be online… boredom leads to exploring their limits.
ALWAYS log out of any websites you have to login to. NEVER share your password.
If you want to keep track of you child’s contacts (or deny them) in MSN, where they have went on the internet, etc… install Windows Live OneCare Family Safety. – It sends your child an email that they have to click on to accept themselves into your “family”.
Most search websites (google, yahoo, etc) set themselves to filter out offensive content, but it can be changed via the “advanced search” options so that anything will be returned when searched for.
In extreme cases you can install a “keylogger” program that tracks all keyboard activity. They may be detected by anti-virus and anti-spyware programs as “bad” programs. Of course there are “anti-keylogger” programs that you kids could find and use against your keylogger. There are also programs that will take pictures of whatever is on the computer at set times in order to see what’s going on.

after all this there are still ways for your kids to get around these protections… create another Facebook, MySpace, MSN account that you don’t know about. The best protection is communication with your child.
They could install and use a different internet browser program like FireFox or Opera. They could use an online chat program or chat room to get around MSN

Tips for your computer in General

make your Internet Explorer cache size smaller. In Internet Explorer click the Tools button, then Internet Options. Now on the “General” tab in the “Browsing History” area click the “Settings” button. Here change the “Disk space used” to 50MB.
From your start menu go to Accessories, then System Tools, then finally “Disk Defragmenter”. Here click “Defragment” to reorganize your hard drive and help it go a bit faster.
From your start menu go to Accessories, then System Tools, then finally “Disk Cleanup”. This program will offer to clean up “junk” on your computer. I usually stick to the options that are selected. If you select the “compress old files” this will take a LONG time and accessing these files in the future could be slow as well… but if you are short on hard drive space you might have to do this.
A faster and less evasive (but still good) program is CCleaner (http://www.ccleaner.com). After you’ve installed and run it, remove it as this program is a good way for your kids to erase their browsing history! (this program is on this disk as ccsetup205.exe)
This you have a virus? This is the website that I use as a guide to removing viruses: http://www.techspot.com/vb/topic58138.html