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Surfing on the world wide webtastic!Most people today have seen or used or even heard about the world wide web. It is used for lots of different things. We already know from the previous Webtastic article that you can use the web for job searching, ordering a college prospectus, careers ideas and all the fun things like ordering CDs, shopping for stuff and checking out the latest band you're into. It is a great way of searching for information, on anything, at anytime, in anyplace! |
Yes, it's true the web is super duper! However, you still need to think about
your personal safety when using it. This article isn't meant to scare you or
put you off surfing for good. It is here to remind you that you have to be aware
of your safety at all times and be sensible about how you use the web and email.
Search engines can help you pick through millions of pieces of information in a matter of seconds. Imagine if you could walk into a huge warehouse full of filing cabinets and shout out a word like "health" and all of the pieces of paper with the word 'health' on the page would fly towards you in the blink of an eye. It is just like that on the web! However, sometimes you can be offered information that links to your search words, but isn't suitable for young people. This can be very upsetting and you should tell your parents or tutors as soon as possible.
If you access anything, even by accident (and this can happen a lot), that makes you feel uncomfortable, then you should speak to someone straight away. There are special organisations such as the Internet Watch Foundation who take reports very seriously and working with the police, investigate lots of web sites. You should find that at school and often at home, your parents and tutors should install some 'filtering software' (which basically means, software that blocks any adult / pornographic or inappropriate web pages coming through to your PC). It's not all 100% effective and you can help yourself by using carefully built directories of websites. There are even special directories specifically for young people! You will find examples on Yahoo, Yahooligans, Wanadoo and so on. You may also find that these may not only be safer but also save you time in searching!
Chat rooms can be good fun…providing you go in the monitored ones aimed at young people. It really can be excellent chatting to another young person from the USA, whilst sitting in your own living room! You can learn a lot about other people and countries and this will all help you with school, work and much more. But….(and there's always a but!), chat rooms can also be more open to problems than any other place on the web, if you don't stick to the safety rules! Think about it like this. You are in town with your mates and this bloke starts talking to you. You've been blind folded, you don't know his name, how old he is, none of your friends know him and you've never seen him before, do you agree to go back to his house for a cuppa after a 5 minute conversation? NO! So why should chat rooms be any different? The problem is that chat rooms can make you feel like you know a person, when really you have absolutely no idea who you are talking to.
Even if someone tells you their name, how could you be sure? After all, if I said my name was Ethel Enderby…how would you know if I was lying?
So an invisible person has sent you a photograph! Does the photo look like them in real life?….oh that's right, you have never met them before! Don't be too trusting, it could be a photo of anyone!
Chat rooms have a nasty habit of putting people at ease. You are not having to talk face to face with new people, so your barriers drop. You feel more confident and sometimes more likely to give information away with out even realising. Always remember that you have no idea who this person is. Keep your personal details….PERSONAL! Remember, if you feel that someone you are chatting to online is a little bit pushy, or keeps asking to meet you, speak to your parents or teacher. Always try and stay in a public chat room rather than being invited to private rooms. If they send you something that makes you feel uncomfortable, TELL SOMEONE! No matter how upset or embarrassed you are, please tell someone who can help stop it from happening to any other young person. There is lots of information available on the web for parents and tutors and if you have been having problems, speak to them and get them to have a read through some of the advice about how they can help YOU! Although you should always be carefully in chat rooms, there are some that are better than others and perhaps you could speak to your connexions adviser to see if that can advise you on safer chatting!
One article isn't barely enough to cover all of the issues about computer safety. You can find lots of more helpful information about instant messaging, computer viruses, email, shopping online, bullying on-line and much more detail about some of the subjects we have briefly looked at above. We keep telling you in these articles to check the web for more information because we know how much useful stuff is on there. What we wanted to do in this article is to make sure you know about how to stay safe online and use it to your advantage and nobody else's!
Now, I could end with a really cheesy slogan like 'Be safe, be smart!'…………..but I'll let you off and hope that you'll just take it all in and be sensible online!
Good luck
Jennie Glitherow
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