Safety for Children

If you are a resident of Lee County, Florida, there is now a new service focused on child safety and sex offenders. The Miami Herald explains the new program and how it will benefit parents in the area:

Residents in one southwest Florida county will get a phone call when a sex offender moves into the neighborhood.

Starting Sunday, Lee County authorities will send the prerecorded calls over land lines within a quarter-mile radius. The messages are similar to those already sent about missing children or Alzheimer’s patients.

Sgt. Tracy Booth says the phone calls will back up information already available on the sheriff’s office Web site or by e-mail alerts. The phone recording also states that the information should not be used to harass anyone.

New York state’s attorney general Andrew Cuomo is fighting to have all child pornography and other questionable material blocked from the internet. With the help of several of the country’s largest internet service providers, he’s off to a good start.

"I feel parents should be with their children or at least in the same room with their children while they’re on the Internet and they should know what sites they’re going to," said Sue Berti of Cicero.

And if they can’t be with their children 24/7, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wants to help. The father of two is on a mission to get every Internet provider in the state to block child pornography.

A total 15 Internet providers in Central New York and the Southern Tier have agreed to block child pornography sites. Our Nneka Nwosu reports on the state’s efforts to make the Internet a safe place for children.
   
Cuomo said, "It’s one of those issues that everybody says it’s terrible and we’ve got to do something about it. And years and years go by and we don’t do enough."

In the last year and a half, 15 Internet providers in Central New York have agreed to block underage porn sites. But that’s not enough. Cuomo says his office and these parents and teachers must also educate children about Internet safety.

That tagline used to run before the late news when I lived in New York City, but now that question is becoming a reality. The Dallas Morning News reports on all of the technology available today to help keep your kids safe and in check, from internet filtering software, to cellphone GPS tracking, down to web cams in cars to track how many teens are in your child’s car.

Determined parents can monitor nearly every important decision their kids make – even when the kids are miles away from home. "I can see why some people worry that parents will become too controlling, but I’ve found that technology actually lets you give kids more freedom," said Steven Johnson, a father of five who lives in McKinney. "If you can eliminate the possibility that a child will make a really bad decision, one that could do lasting harm, you can let your kids experiment with and learn from all kinds of situations."

As a great reference point, the article lists out some of the technologies you can implement to keep an eye on your child in various ways. But does it go too far?