How kids lie to parents about life online

Kids lie about their online behaviour to their parents, claims yet another survey stating the blindingly obvious
Kids lie about their online behaviour to their parents, claims yet another survey stating the blindingly obvious

A new report by web security specialists Symantec claims that children are becoming increasingly adept at hiding details of their online lives from their parents.

Symantec's Online Living survey looked into the online habits of both parents and kids.

How much time do you think your kids are spending online? According to Symantec's survey while British parents believe their children are online for 18.8 hours per month, the actual time their kids are online for is an average of 43.5 hours.

What about what your kids are looking at online? Of those British parents questioned, while 81 per cent said they were confident they knew what their kids were viewing online, 31 per cent of the British kids in the survey said their mum and dads had no idea what they were looking at online.

Hmmm. Surely some discrepancy here somewhere?!

Setting boundaries for online behaviour

20 per cent of the 6,427 parents surveyed said they had caught their kids looking at 'unsuitable' sites.

"It's not about coming down hard on them when they encounter inappropriate content," according to Marian Merritt, Symantec's internet safety advocate.

"The internet is a great place to learn and to play, but there have to be boundaries."

In more encouraging news a third of the British kids in the survey said they had befriended their parents via an online social network! Plus 75 per cent of the parents said they talk to their kids about online safety.

via BBC

Adam Hartley