Each month we provide you with tips, suggestions and ideas on how to make your Internet experience more enjoyable and safer for your family and your computer.
 

APRIL 2008 - PREDATOR PREVENTION.

Stopping the Porn Predators.
There are basically three 'types' of "Adult sites" on the Internet.

• The first type of adult site tries to operate in a responsible manner, by rating its pages and making the site filterable by child protection software.  They provide their material ONLY to adults.

• The second category of adult sites doesn't know any better. They either have not been informed of the ways to operate responsibly. They need to be educated.

• The third type is the most dangerous. These adult sites are run by "porn predators", people who have no ethics or would use any means possible to "site spam" you or your child.

"Site spamming" is similar to email spamming but instead of bombarding the email box, these sinister sites use trickery and deception to lure and then bombard the monitor with filth.  Once a child is in their Web site trap, there appears to be no escape because closing one window only opens another with even more graphic images.
 

How Porn Predators Operate
These sites are after bulk viewers. They hope that by getting ten million viewers, one of them will be foolish enough to submit his credit card. However, in their mad rush to lure eyeballs, they have abandoned all connection to the truth. They want people to think that their site is anything other than a porn site.  Unscrupulous porn sites purchase the domain names of child-oriented Web sites that have gone out of business in an effort to skim the traffic from links that have not been updated. For example, someone puts up a page filled with links of great places for a child to visit.  As does sometimes happen, one of the places closes down and loses its domain name. Immediately, a porn predator snatches it up.  However, the owner of the page of child links is still unaware that anything has happened.  The adult site is set up like a spider trap for the unwary. Closing one browser window only causes another browser window to open up. Sometimes, this is designed to continue forever.  This results in a state of panic in the child who is aware of no remedy other than shutting off the computer.
 

How to Stop Porn Predators
Now that you are aware of the problem, how do we deal with these predators?  First, by realizing that they are liars and con-artists.  They are not who the first amendment was created to protect.  In fact, their actions have nothing to do with free speech and everything to do with child endangerment.  Secondly, we must take united action. Every time you encounter a link that should lead to a child's site but leads to a porn site, contact the owner of the web page where you saw it.  Google has instituted an excellent feature called SafeSearch Filtering.

Porn predators depend upon both the apathy of parents and on the fact that most people only know a little about operating their computers. Overcoming apathy is up to you, but our mission is to provide you with the tools and knowledge to fight back.  With this in mind, here's an important trick to break the cycle of never ending browser windows on PCs.

Whenever you want to close a browser window, get in the habit of pressing the CONTROL key and the W key together. The CONTROL key is the one which reads "CTRL". It is located at the bottom corner of your keyboard.  If you happen into a porn trap, hold down the CTRL key and press the W key at the same time. If this does not work, you can also press the Alt key and the F4 key at the top of your keyboard.  You should be free of the invading windows in a few seconds.

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