12 year old Son accessing web sites

jos_kel

Hi,
Long story short. School principal rang me today about some WhatsApp text sent between 2 pupils, neither of whom was my Son.
Apparently there was a link to PornHub in it and a parent had correctly contacted the school.
The principal said that when quizzed they said my Son had shown him it.
She said she spoke to my Son and he admitted to accessing Pornhub once and the “Dark Web” was also mentioned.
Obviously shocked. My son has ADHD and so is very immature and easily led and will blurt out what other kids would know but would never say.
Had a chat with him and told him it was not acceptable nor appropriate.
I had never even heard of the “Dark Web” until now but intend to educate myself.
Does anyone know if there’s a parent forum specifically for keeping abreast of what’s out there that kids may be exposed to.

markmoto

jos_kel wrote: »

Hi,
Long story short. School principal rang me today about some WhatsApp text sent between 2 pupils, neither of whom was my Son.
Apparently there was a link to PornHub in it and a parent had correctly contacted the school.
The principal said that when quizzed they said my Son had shown him it.
She said she spoke to my Son and he admitted to accessing Pornhub once and the “Dark Web” was also mentioned.
Obviously shocked. My son has ADHD and so is very immature and easily led and will blurt out what other kids would know but would never say.
Had a chat with him and told him it was not acceptable nor appropriate.
I had never even heard of the “Dark Web” until now but intend to educate myself.
Does anyone know if there’s a parent forum specifically for keeping abreast of what’s out there that kids may be exposed to.

Don't you have parental controls software installed on the phone & laptop?

jos_kel

markmoto wrote: »

Don't you have parental controls software installed on the phone & laptop?

I saw FamilyZone mentioned online.
Do you recommend this or can you recommend another one?

RebelButtMunch

He's not accessing the dark Web without any special software on the computer. Check for that.

Another option is the screen time software

olestoepoke

We have an 11 and 9 year old, I use Google family link. It works really well, not only are 18 rated sites blocked I get a monthly report each month that tells me what google searches they made so if one of them were to google something sinister like 'beheadings' I can have a chat with them and tell them why they shouldn't watch certain things on the net. Its tough to keep them off certain sites completely as all it takes is one of their friends to have access on their phones, all I can do as a parent is look after my side. I also believe in having a good relationship with them so that if they are curious about anything they can come ask me about it and ill answer truthfully, this has led to some uncomfortable conversations over the last couple of years but I never lie or avoid answering and it seems to work well.

TheFairy

Had similar with my son years ago. Installed some software called "Watchdog", and put it on max limits. It then barked through the speakers if anything untoward was accessed.

B-D-P--

I'm not saying he's wrong.
But from what I hear the dark web is quiet hard to navigate.

Maybe he was on a porn site thinking it was dark web?
All the same as mentioned look for the software needed to access dark web, you cant get to it on Chrome or IE.

Good luck with this, good that your actively taking steps. Dont beat yourself up over it either, everyone makes mistakes.

Hoboo

Unless hes pretty tech savvy and knows his way around programs like TOR he's not on the dark web.

As for porn, shock horror 12 year old boys are fascinated with boobs since birth, suddenly they have a new interest and it's not for feeding. Pornhub I agree is a bit much for a 12 year old, was scraps of mags in the bikeshed back in the day but that was limited and mild compared to what he could access, might be time for that chat, some parental controls, and supervision of online access in general.

jos_kel

Hoboo wrote: »

Unless hes pretty tech savvy and knows his way around programs like TOR he's not on the dark web.

As for porn, shock horror 12 year old boys are fascinated with boobs since birth, suddenly they have a new interest and it's not for feeding. Pornhub I agree is a bit much for a 12 year old, was scraps of mags in the bikeshed back in the day but that was limited and mild compared to what he could access, might be time for that chat, some parental controls, and supervision of online access in general.

In general, point taken.
But it's to ensure that there is a line that shouldn't be crossed and I suppose to agree with him where that line is.

Neyite

Do you track what he sees on his phone/ tablet? Does he know what he's allowed to have and not have on his devices?

My 9 year old has a kindle Fire. It's got a parent profile and a kids one. For anything, I need to log into the parent profile and add it to his - so that's for accessing any websites, downloading any kinds of apps, or any in-app purchases, it has to go through me. As well as that, you can set the age of the child on the profile so it filters only appropriate content though to him.

He's not allowed multiplayer games, or any sort of profile creation for apps such as YouTube. That will change as he gets older but for now, it's more than enough.

His older cousins have their phones and tablets linked to their parent's devices. They are allowed a phone on their 13th birthday, and only allowed apps that are for their age. So, for example not allowed a snapchat account until they turn 13. The agreement is that at any stage, the parent can look at their phone, or check who they are communicating with and remove apps or contacts if they need to. Abuse of apps is also subject to removal - so say they were using whatsapp to send around nasty messages, it get deleted or the device removed.

There's strict rules about tablets and phones remaining downstairs at all times. Again,if that rule is broken, gets removed for a week. Basically they need to check with their parents before getting any app, and installing it secretly isn't possible due to the log the parents can check. Parent's can also monitor google searches and what websites the've accessed but ones that are 18+ are blocked.

Honestly, I mean this in the nicest way, but if you don't know how to monitor his device and lock it down so he can't access adult content, he really shouldn't have a phone until you do. That's not a criticism, because we were the same. We let our lad have our ipad when he was so small he didn't know how to install stuff but You-tube was occasionally leading him to stuff that was slightly dodgy. So it 'broke' until I could get him the right one that I could control. I didn't know were to start but I looked online to see what devices other kids have and what content they were allowed until I was able to figure it out. Even now when he asks for something he knows that mum has to check it out first and decide. It does help that his peer group have similar or even stricter rules than we do though.

PCros

Neyite wrote: »

He's not allowed multiplayer games, or any sort of profile creation for apps such as YouTube. That will change as he gets older but for now, it's more than enough.

Just on YouTube, if you have no account for him he can still watch YouTube and it doesn’t save any search history for what he is searching for.

So what I did is create a Gmail account that I will hand over to him in a few years. This way he is logged into YouTube all the time on his tablet and there is a history trail. This is also logged to my Gmail aswell.

FYI I work in IT Security and would be familiar with the Dark Web. I really doubt any 12 year olds are accessing it.

I suspect any porn sites that these lads are accessing is being referred to as the Dark Web. Partly because it sounds cool but it means they can refer to it and know they mean porn without saying the word.

Just in case, look on the laptop for any mention of a program called Tor. Thats whats needed to access the Dark Web.

Neyite

PCros wrote: »

Just on YouTube, if you have no account for him he can still watch YouTube and it doesn’t save any search history for what he is searching for.

So what I did is create a Gmail account that I will hand over to him in a few years. This way he is logged into YouTube all the time on his tablet and there is a history trail. This is also logged to my Gmail aswell.

That's really good to know, thanks.

mohawk

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cavan_man2021

OP I would suggest you use a private dns server on your son's phone. It will prevent him accessing porn and the dark Web without having to install software.

If you go to settings, network and dns.

Put this in

family-filter-dns.cleanbrowsing.org

You can read more about it on public opendns