Your teenagers are most probably already active online, whether or not you are aware of it is a rather irrelevant factor to be honest...

 

 

In fact, it is assumed that a large number of such incidents occur without parents, teachers or other "elders" being aware of it. In fact, in the times where we do see such involvement or knowledge from the parents of such kids, are often also the same times when we hear about these issues. The thing is that as we have all at some stage been a teenager and ourselves gone through the normal trials & tribulations of high school, we all know a number of things to be true. I speak from a personal perspective here purely but, my parents knew very little about much at all about my life when I was a teenager. Also, I learned that kids can truly be cruel at times.

 

With the ongoing changes in our societies, today the law sometimes does not adequately support or assist very effectively and we are continuing to see some interesting applications of the existing law in ways we have not otherwise seen before (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10698575).

NetSafe is an independent non-profit organisation that promotes confident, safe, and responsible use of Cyberspace. They have established a number of initiatives, resources & websites, established to support the community through this digital revolution. 

CYBERKIDS is aimed at young children, while the NETSAFE BASICS website is the more middle of the road site and the only one which could be considered as aiming for teenagers.   HECTORS WORLD is a comprehensive school resource designed to foster digital citizenship and safe online behavior for 2 -9 year olds.  INMYDAY is a support resource for parents & caregivers of children in New Zealand.

 

ECPAT Child Alert Line provides a service to report URLs that breach the child pornography laws and have established a project with the Department of Internal Affairs to try and minimise this activity online.  (http://www.ecpat.org.nz/Projects/Internet-Digital-Filtering.aspx) They recognise the very real threats present when any user gets online... One of their projects developed focuses on the filters of digital content: "The expansion of the internet has led to many positive developments.  However, it is evident that criminals, individuals as well as organised groups, are also using this technology as a means of producing, collecting and distributing images of child sexual abuse."