Do you know what your kids are doing online? That’s the question Tim Brady asks when he talks about his work protecting children from internet predators. After nine years shielding kids, this Boise Police detective has some advice for parents when it comes to the Internet and safety.
Brady is part of Idaho’s Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) task force. Since the national Department of Justice organization got started 17 years ago, ICAC has arrested more than 53,500 people for crimes against children. In Idaho, 237 have been arrested.
There are many places online to find tips for parents and kids to stay safe on the Internet. Here are a few from Brady and his fellow ICAC officers.
Pay Attention To Your Kids
“Your kid’s grades are dropping, and before they talked to you and confided in you, and all of sudden there’s a wall up and they don’t want to do anything with you or they don’t want to talk to you anymore,” Brady says of the warning signs. “And they’re spending a lot of time on their iPod or iPhone or their tablet, secret accounts that you’re finding, that you don’t know about, all that kind of stuff is cause for concern.”
Brady says that doesn’t always mean there’s a sexual predator involved, but it’s something he tells parents to look out for.
Be Involved In What Your Kids Are Doing
Brady says it's important to watch what kids are doing on social media.
“Know what kind of pictures they're posting, what they’re saying on Facebook - be friends with them," he says.
Brady says this goes along with being the parental authority.
Think of it this way, Brady says: “You don’t just let your kid go play with some random child that you’ve never met their parents.” He says getting into their online social life means you'll notice if there are any red flags.
Don’t Be Afraid To Take Control
He says parents are in control of whatever devices their kids have, whether they bought them or not.
“They are the child and sometimes we need to be parents,” he says, “You don’t need an iPhone at 12-years-old, you can take them away.”
He also recommends taking the digital devices away at bedtime.
“We don’t advocate that kids have stuff in their room behind doors, as far as laptops, tablets - that kind of stuff.”
LOL, BRB, TTYL. Internet Slang And Your Kids.
Brady says you don’t really need to know a lot of weird terms and Internet slang when it comes to protecting your kids.
“There’s not a magical list of secret codes,” he says. There are acronyms, but “when these guys are soliciting who they think is a minor, they’re pretty overt about what they want.”
Overt usually means graphic and explicit language.
“It doesn’t take a genius when he says I want to do x, y and z to your body, to who he thinks is a 12-year-old,” says Brady. “You can figure it out.”
What About My Child’s Privacy?
“It’s not like when we grew up,” says Casey Hemmer, ICAC Commander for Idaho. Before the Internet, kids had diaries and “parents respected that privacy and would not look at that diary,” says Hemmer. But that’s when diaries stayed under the bed.
“It wasn’t out in the world," Hemmer says. "Now everything kids do is out there, it’s memorialized.”
He says parents should set a policy with their kids, who don't always understand Internet dangers.
“Everybody on the Internet is a stranger, but in a kid's mind – if they’ve talked to them – it’s their best friend.”
Sexual Predators Work To Convince Kids They're Nice
“These guys groom kids, they do things to separate them from their parents or people who are responsible for them and try to put a kind of divide there so they won’t confide in them,” Detective Tim Brady says. One way they do that is by sending kids special gifts.
“I’ve been sent everything from plane tickets to bus tickets to lingerie to phones to iPods to gift cards, all in secret,” Brady says. Phones are a real giveaway. Predators send him phones all the time; it’s one of their tactics. Assuming he's a young girl, predators also tell him to keep the phones secret and hidden.
Brady says sexual predators are good at preying on kids during what can be tumultuous times in their lives.
“Adolescence is a rough time in the first place even if you live in a good home with supportive parents that are there for you,” he says.
Kids in troubled homes or dealing with other issues can be even more vulnerable to predators' techniques.
“These guys are very, very good at manipulating and lying and deceiving; that’s their game and they’ve perfected it.”
So if your child suddenly has a new phone that you’ve never seen before, it’s time to start asking questions.
Don’t Stay Silent
If you think your kid is in trouble, speak up. Brady says he encourages parents – no matter how small the situation might be or how scary or how hopeless it may seem – to contact police.
“It’s not always as hopeless as it may seem and despite what they may think or what’s out there, we do have methods to be able to track these people down, and hold them accountable,” says Brady.
Find Samantha Wright on Twitter @samwrightradio
Copyright 2015 Boise State Public Radio
