VERY inappropriate internet behavior, from my 15 yo

Hey guys,
I'm particularly interested in the opinions of others with teenagers, b/c honestly, there's a vast difference between theoretical parenting and what you really wind up doing when your kid is a teenager. When my kids were little, I had all kinds of ideas about the way it was gonna be when they hit puberty. Well, that's all gone out the window now, or some of it anyway. But anyone with a good idea, I'm open.
I allow my kids to have computers in their rooms. I understand that in itself would be a bad move for some people here, and I get that, but I believe that kids are entitled to a certain amount of trust and freedom UNTIL they show that they aren't mature enough to handle it. Well, that time has come, but I'm really looking for a more nuanced solution than simply yanking the computer out of his room.
Dh is a techie, and probably one of the few parents who are still smarter and more technologically adept than their adolescent kids. Though my ds knows how to cover his tracks fairly well, dh unearthed some logs of recent chats he's had that are, to be candid, the raunchiest stuff I've read in a long time. He's assuming false identities, sometimes he's a girl, sometimes he's a boy, but he's engaging in deeply disturbing sexual conversations with adult perverts, (unless they are also assuming false identities) who are clearly titilated by it and egging him on. He's not sharing any personal info, and it's clear to me he has no intention of going any farther than these pornographic phone sex type of conversations, which he's either getting off on in some way, thinks is funny, or likely, a combo of the two.
I think the impulses are coming from typical sexual curiousity, and the propensity for just liking to mess with other people's heads. Hey, wouldn't it be funny to mess with the "pervs"- that kind of thing. I understand the sexual impulses- he's a 15yo boy who's been let loose in the candy store. But he's obviously in wayyyyyyyyyyyyy over his head now, and we need to intervene for his well being. I think he doesn't have the maturity, life experience, or sound decision making skills necessary to understand how dangerous his behavior is. And beyond that, I would like his sexual "awakenings" not to be tangled up in the dysfunctional perversions of adult online predators.
Can you guys give me some practical advice about different softwares or strategies that we can consider? For now, we're telling him he's not to delete the history- and if he does, he'll be off the computer, period. But I also am concerned that in 2 short years, he'll be away at school, with no one looking over his shoulder. I want to give him the life skills he needs to safely navigate his online life once he's on his own, away from our house, etc.. That's why I've allowed the computer in the room to begin with. My parents had so many rules when I was a kid, and when I went away to college, I went NUTS, in all sorts of unhealthy ways. But this is in many ways a different world he's living in- and i need to give him the tools he needs to be safe amidst all the wack jobs on the other side of the keyboard.
I know this is long. Thank you to whomever got to the bottom of this.

Yikes. I honestly am NOT looking forward to my kids hitting puberty. Horrifying.

There are tons of "tracking" programs that log keystrokes etc. I don't think that this should be the ONLY thing you do, but maybe if he knows he's being watched he'll think first. That doesn't do much for actually nurturing his inner "morality police," though. Ugh. I wish I had more answers.

This looked like a good site safetysurf.com. HTH

you know I watched this movie last night on Lifetime all about this. About a teen who had a computer in his room and started surfing porn etc. There are a lot of things to install on that computer that will secretly log everything he does and can even give transcripts etc.

I would suggest moving the computer out of his room and if there is one in a common room tell him he can only use that one. If he gets to hooked on this it will become an addiction and start to interfere with other things like schoolwork etc.

On the movie the kid eventually snagged moms credit card to buy access into sites etc because he was so hooked. It is a good thing you discovered it now and you will have to set limits on the computer thing...at least put a parental block on the computer resticting sites.

Good luck and I hope you can turn him around

Umm in my opinion that has constituted not be able to handle having a computer in their room - I would remove it immediately and make sure he knows you know what is going on

I think you're absolutely right that it can turn into addictive, dysfuntional behavior. If this was a one-shot deal, I would have been much less disturbed, but the logs indicate he's been doing this for the better part of the past month. Ugh! Thanks for the advice!

I don't know what the answer is because i never want to think about being in this situation BUT even if you do take the computer out of the room, it really doesn't solve anything. Have you talked to him about what he's doing? I think having a very deep convo with him about his behaviour, what is wrong and what is acceptable, what is normal, etc, etc is the best way to go then after the convo depending on what he says - then take the computer out of the room or not.

Well I dont have any experience in this yet but I think other than the tracking and he knowing about it. For me it would be more of safty of the internet, and while he might see it as harmless fun, there are sickos out there looking for prey, and you have to be so careful as to whats said and done on line even the smallest hints could lead them to right to you.

I really dont look foward to teenage years

Oh geez Jeanne. I have no idea what I'd do but maybe have him research and write a paper on internet pornography and the determental effects it has on young women, or perhaps have him research online predators and some of the risks. I'd have him write a paper and turn it in to you and DH then discuss it with him.

Oh my gosh, first of all lots of to you b/c I know I would be pretty shell shocked.

I think you're right on about the why's of it....natural curiosity, thinking it's funny to mess with these people, etc....but in todays world that is not only inappropriate for his age but not necessarily safe. I don't have to deal with this yet so I have no suggestions, but I think you hit another nail on the head in that it's not just about following rules but equipping him with the skills he needs to make good decisions.

I know teens are physiologically not capable of understand long term consequences...they *think* they do, and in some instances they might vaguely, but it's still a fairly abstract concept. I think my main focus would be more about trying to help him understand what and why this is unacceptable than the punishment or discipline aspect, but I have no idea how I would go about that.

A school counselor might have some suggestions, I know you'd probably rather not take it there but they've probably dealt with this kind of thing before.

OHHHH, Cary, that's brilliant! Before this all happened, I did give him an article i recently read in "The New Yorker" about that whole MySpace suicide- the 14 yo girl who was having an online relationship with who she thought was a 15 yo boy but was actually the mother of an ex-friend down the street setting her up until she was driven to suicide. I was telling him about it, all the while not knowing he was engaging in this nonsense, and he did seem particularly interested in what was/was not being done to the offending mother. In hindsight, it all makes sense.

that was the saddest case ever. I heard about that too.

The idea behind having him write a paper is that 1. writing a report on anything is awful (maybe ground him until it's done). 2. Having to discuss your findings on sexuality with your parents would be pretty awful too. LOL 3. perhaps finding info on how online sexual activity effects others, would help to to get out of the "me" stage that teens are almost always in. at least for a bit.

Cary's idea might also help drive home the point that you really don't know WHO you are talking to.

For shock factor (this is what we did with Brandon who was engaging in similar behavior) you can contact your local authority and ask to speak to someone in the department who deals with internet sex crimes. Our guys go to the local schools and have spoken with the teens about the effects and what can happen on line. What it can lead to. Shawn and I weren't getting through to him. Brandon was allowed on the "main" computer in the house. The computer was no longer allowed in his room. He lost that right. He was to have the door open at all times. Shawn had installed a program you had to have a password to clear the history. Every key stroke made on the computer was logged. Over zealous on our part, NOPE. We brought him to the department where I work. My internet guy sat down with him, without us in the room, and gave him the shock of his life. Sometimes it coming from someone other then mom and dad (because we all know we don't know crap, right?) has a much more positive effect on them.

Best of luck to you.

First, Jeanne, I'm sorry you have to deal with this situation. I fully understand your concerns and you're absolutely right to be so! Good work on DH's part for keeping an eye on what he's been up to. I was like the over-the-shoulder cop for my kids and they never had a networked computer in their bedroom (still don't - all of our computers are in the common areas).

I absolutely love Cary's idea, and I would add that it would be good for him to see to what end his behavior could lead, including the not so savory parts like kidnapping, rape and even death. So if you're going to have him do this research make sure he sees the ugly as well.

First thing I would do is, if he has one, remove the webcam. Key loggers mentioned earlier will not record video feeds and downloads outside of the chat portions. The next thing I would do is make certain he doesn't have administrative access to his computer. Most operating system have tiered access levels and below administrator level it's more difficult to remove all traces of activity by not allowing access to the registry (in a Windows system - I'm sure Apple's OS has similar features).

If you want to watch him without intruding on his bedroom privacy, there is an excellent product who's data and reports are all web based. Once you install it, you never have to touch it again. It's not cheap at $97.00, but if you really want to watch what's going on, this product gets the best ratings. It's called Webwatcher, and you only need access to the internet to see what's going on if you decide that is the route you need to take.

Thanks so much, guys. All really good, reassuring advice. I'll keep you posted on how it all goes down.

I got to thinking about this at work today, and I think we should all take a very clear lesson here. Today this is happening in Jeanne's household, but tonight or tomorrow this could happen in any one of our houses with one of our kids, male or female. I went back into my CCD lesson plans and got the link to the Child Lures Prevention Program, because I remembered there was some helpful info online there as well. Among the links on the page I came across the Famiily Internet Safety Pact. It's a downloadable PDF contract that states what we expect from our kids in their online behavior, and why we feel it is important. All of us who have kids that independently surf cyberspace should consider sitting down with our kids and going through this contract, having everyone sign in and place it near the computer area as a constant reminder of the promises made. Let's face it, kids are tempted to do wrong everyday. Perhaps if we're candid and open with them about what we expect and clear about the dangers posed by online predators, we can at least do our part to lock the scumbag predators out of our kids lives.

But remember, he will also be 2 years older and have 2 more years of maturity.

Just a suggestion. I have a 15 yr old step son. Just a suggestion for you. Scare him. Since you know what program he is using to chat with make up a fake screen name and start talking to him. I know it wont be comfortable for you as a parent but after a few days start scaring him by telling him you know who he is and then progress farther by saying you know where he lives, ect. I know its not something you wanna do but sometimes we have to do things like that to make them realize that there are people out there who can find that stuff just by an screen name.

Sorry you have to go through this.

Jeanne,
I am glad you and your DH found this out. I think you have gotten great advice. The Child Lures agreement from Ed's link is a good one. The idea to have him research is good too.
The program I use/used to watch my son's chats was ChatWatch. I think their website was Chatwatch.net. The one Ed mentioned I looked at too, Can't remember why I choose this one.
I always admire how you handle situations with your children and know that you are handling this well too.
Good Luck and keep us posted.

Anne Marie

Good luck with whatever you do!!!

You're an absolute genius, I will take this advice with me to my grave or at least until my kids are out of their teenage years

Jeanne, really I love her advice here, it's point on!

Personally, I agree with everyone on talking to him and making sure he understands ALL the aspects of what he's doing. Sometimes it's hard, I know. I had a son who liked to set fires in our old house. His bedroom was in the attic that was completely done in untreated pine. We found out, like you, by accident that he was doing this... and at 2, 3 and 4 in the morning when the other 4 of us were sound asleep in a house built in the late 1800's that was all hardwood and no fireproofing in it. I Googled fire victims with him sitting next to me. Actually found a pic of a family that matched us - not that you could really recognize them as people anymore. It killed me to do it. As a mom, you want to PROTECT your children from things, not subject them to it! But it worked. He never played with fire again.

Computerally [not a word, I know, lol], being a Geek myself, I know there's a few things that you could do so here's my $5 worth:

Follow the advice mentioned before on setting up his own profile on his computer and set it as "Guest". Set a password on the Administration account. Make one up that's easy for you to remember, but next to impossible for someone else to figure out. Include letter AND numbers in it, EG.: A1B2C3D4E5. It's even 99% foolproof for a password bot to figure out!! Then, uninstall his chatting program. On a Guest account, you can't install anything.

My children have their own puter and each has their own profile on it. Both are set to Guest and DS wanted to play one of his CD games on it and I couldn't install it. Drove me nuts trying to figure out why until I realized I was logged into HIS account and not mine, lol.

If he's looking at porn sites [or any other inappropriate sites], it's possible to block these, making them totally inaccessible to be viewed. If you're using IE, it's very easy to do, it's just a matter of editing your Hosts file. You'd need the URL's for the sites, though. PM me for details if you want to go this route.

If he deletes his tracks, there's a FREE program called Spybot Search & Destroy that rids your puter of spyware, adware, etc, and it has a setting inside of it that LOCKS the controls for IE so they can't be deleted within IE. It does not work with either Firefox or Netscape, so if these are on his puter, or any other browser, you'll want to uninstall them [maybe check out his bookmarks first so you'll have the URL's for the sites if you want to block them in the Hosts file. You can Export these so you don't have to type them out.]

IE also has a password Content Advisor that will block bad words/picture sites.

Depending on what kind of internet hook-up you have, why not just "pull the plug"? You can also turn off the internet connection - assuming he's not too puter literate and would figure it out. Heck, you can disable the modem itself in Device Manager even [very easy to turn it back on].

If you have a router, you can block sites with it as well.

I found a FREE program called WebAllow [ver.1.21]. It's for IE and you set it up with a passworded list of sites that are ALLOWED and those are the ONLY sites he can view.

I think that's all the advice I wanted to say, if I think of anything else, I'll post again.

If you have ANY questions, feel free to PM me! I can explain everything here except how to block using a router - that's a little over my head, but I have a router as well and I'll figure it out for you depending on what you want to do.

Good luck!!

This post has been edited by Teesa®© on Feb 23 2008, 09:04 PM