Children are the main users of internet resources in the modern world, and they can't imagine their existence without:
- Computers;
- Gadgets;
- Phones;
- Tablets.
Thus, they spend a lot of time online and can easily become victims of fraudulent schemes. Scammers gain children's trust and may involve them in a scam. Therefore, parents should be attentive to their children and be aware of:
- the websites they use;
- who they communicate with online;
- how they use the internet;
- what information they post on social networks.
This will help protect the child and their family from scammers' interference.
Protecting Children Online
To ensure safe internet use for children, it is necessary to have a conversation with them and explain the rules they must follow to avoid falling into the scammers' trap.
Here are some of them:
- do not share personal data on social networks;
- create strong passwords;
- regularly change passwords;
- avoid private conversations on social networks and messengers;
- do not share their geolocation.
The best way to protect a child online is through self-monitoring of technological devices:
- it's necessary to check gadgets for updates and current software;
- privacy settings should be configured to minimize data collection from the device;
- it's recommended to cover the webcam when not in use;
- posting personal photos at the request of unknown people is dangerous.
When receiving a message from an unknown person, it is necessary to find out who they are and study their profile. Determine if there are common friends or acquaintances. Explain to the child that they are not obligated to accept everyone as friends because the internet allows people to pretend to be anyone, and the truth is not always apparent. Therefore, it is important to take an interest in what the child does online, primarily to ensure their safety, not for total control.
Financial Scammers
Scammers are dishonest people, so deceiving a child is not a problem for them. There are already several types of online financial scams targeting children. Scammers often extract information about parents' bank cards, for example, by offering to buy artifacts in an online game at a good price using the parent's card. A child, without realizing it, might agree and, if they have access to the parent's card, provide the number, password, and even the CVV code.
They offer children easy money using bank cards. They play out a scam scheme like transferring money or receiving money to pass on to others. In doing so, personal bank data from bank cards is revealed, and scammers can easily take advantage of the child's naivety, for which parents will naturally be financially responsible.
Online Safety
Given that adults also fall victim to scammers and their cunning schemes, it's no wonder that protecting children is not easy. In most cases, parents try to safeguard the child by installing special programs that allow parental control. These programs are configured for the child's age category and are aimed at:
- filtering out adult content;
- filtering out spam messages;
- blocking unnecessary ads;
- providing content according to the age set in the settings.
This type of software allows parents to protect the child's psyche, although it's possible that scammers can easily pose as teenagers looking for friends, both in computer games and on social networks. Therefore, they infiltrate almost everywhere.
Relying on programs is, of course, good, but computer literacy and internet behavior rules must be conveyed to the child.
Children and Scams
Most often, children encounter scams in online computer games, where there are many dishonest players, not only adults but also children, who are ready to deceive for a beneficial achievement or artifact that can be exchanged in games. Dishonest players offer favorable exchanges, deceiving the child by taking an artifact and giving nothing in return; this is how they cheat in games. They may also offer to buy rare abilities for the player and ask to play for a while but not return the rare unit.
Such actions greatly upset children and perhaps teach them, providing experience in communicating with people online. A child may subsequently react aggressively to any requests and actions from other internet users. It is necessary to explain to the child that not all users are scammers, to learn the main signs and questions of scammers that they ask, to learn to distinguish positive users from fraudsters.
If conversations involve money, bank cards, gifts, surprises, and others, the child should understand that this could all be a trap by scammers.