A colleague recently mentioned that their middle-school daughter had made a friend on MySpace. A few chat conversations made the child uncomfortable, and the father looked over her shoulder during her next conversation with the ‘friend’. After observing some leading questions and inappropriate comments, the parent cancelled his daughter’s MySpace account and reported the incident to the FBI. The ‘friend’ was a stalker, later arrested in an FBI child-porn sting operation.

Not every parent is this vigilant. Not every kid is as comfortable discussing things like this with a parent. Here are some basic tactics that can help keep kids cybersafe.

1. Supervise your child’s online activities:
   • Limit the amount of time your child spends on non-school-related computer activity.
   • Monitor which sites they are surfing, either automatically (AOL Parental Controls, Net Nanny) or by daily discussions about what they’ve found online.
   • Keep your computer in a high-traffic area in your house, where you can see your children’s reactions to the sites they visit.

2. Set boundaries on what your child is allowed to do on the computer.
   • Discourage children from posting photos or giving personal information in a chat room, website forum, or email message to someone you don’t know.
   • Do not allow kids to use a webcam unless you are present.
   
   
3. Maintain open communication with your children.
   • Teach kids that not everything people say online is true. People can and will misrepresent themselves in email messages and chat rooms.
   • Urge them to talk to you if they recognize suspicious behavior on the Internet.
   • Warn children about personally meeting any online contact.
   • Remind children to always protect passwords and personal information.

4. Take action when needed.
   • Record usernames and passwords, and remind your children remember to change their passwords periodically.
   • Report messages that are suggestive or threatening to the service provider (MySpace, AOL chat rooms, etc.) and to local, state and federal law enforcement authorities. Both stalking and cyberbullying (criminal Internet harassment or intimidation) are illegal.
   • Install and regularly update anti-virus, firewall, and anti-spyware software. Develop a regular routine for maintaining the security of your home computer system. Nick Francesco’s “Security Tango” is a good way to start.
   
   

5. Take advantage of online resources for parents and kids to learn more about protecting yourself and your family online.
   
   • FBI: “A Parent’s Guide to Internet Safety“
   
   
   • FTC: “OnGuard Online“
   
   
   • US Department of Justice: “Project Safe Childhood“
   
   
   • “CyberAngels“
   
   
   • “WiredSafety“
   
   
   • “Cybersmart Kids Online“
   
   

President Joseph Uhal at the first 2006-2007 Rochester Chapter Administrative Council meeting at Nazareth College on September 25, 2006.

When the minutes are approved, they will be made available to chapter members. In the meantime, a few personal notes…

• Elaine Montambeau from STC Central NY Chapter joined us on the phone to discuss future cooperation between our chapters. We agreed to exchange web site links and event announcements as a first step, and continue discussions about other possible areas where collaboration could be beneficial to both chapters.


• We began the annual budged process with a request from Treasurer Louise Remington for a detailed breakdown of expenses from last season. Chapter officers and committee managers will provide this information and the discussion will continue at the next council meeting.


• The Proof Sheet is now being published as a blog at www.proof-sheet.org. The blog format has several advantages:
  
  • Articles can be published more quickly after submission.
  
  
  • All articles and columns are stored in a searchable content management system which can be searched by date, title, author, keyword, or category.
  
  
  • Readers can easily comment on specific articles as well as provide feedback on the newsletter itself.
  
  
  • Authors of regular columns can publish their own material. (Want a bylined clip for your portfolio? This is a great way to start!)



• Joe plans to form a Past Presidents committee to discuss bylaws revision, strategic planning, and coordination of our efforts to compete for the Society’s Distinguished Chapter Award.

Next Council Meeting: October 23

STC-Rochester Administrative Council meetings are held on the 4th Monday of the month. All members are invited to attend.

Nazareth College
Golisano Academic Center, Room 463
Phone: Conference call
Toll free: 1-877-922-9520
Pass code: 309338#

Our first program meeting for the 2006-2007 season took place on Tuesday, September 19 at RIT. We were in one of the function rooms in the Louise Slaughter building, with a beautiful view and plenty of room for milling around.

RIT student staff provided an indoor picnic buffet, with hot dogs, baked beans, sloppy joes (the best I’ve had in years—very spicy!), several salads, and a tray of bite-sized desserts.

About 30 people attended. We had plenty of time to schmooz with old friends and welcome some prospective members who came to see what STC was like and were immediately recruited for various volunteer committees.

After dinner, Ann Wiley (STC Fellow and long-time Rochester chapter member) organized a round-robin of introductions. We caught up with old friends who have changed jobs, learning where they now worked and what they were doing. The first-timers learned a bit about why we chose to join STC, and what benefits we’ve gotten from our membership.

It was an enjoyable, relaxing way to start the season!

We’ve moved the Proof Sheet to its own domain to resolve a space problem on the STC-Rochester web server. Your new Proof Sheet will be in blog format. This makes it possible to search for previous articles by topic, as well as by date, and provides a convenient way for readers to comment on specific articles. We hope these new features will make you happy. (The blog format also allows for much more efficient content management, which will make your editor very happy, indeed.)

Current Season

Our plan, at the moment, is to post the table of contents for each current issue on the STC-Rochester site with a link to the newsletter site for the full-text articles and columns.

Individual articles will be tagged with categories. There will be a running history of Chapter and Society news, and you will be able to browse through features and columns by topic.

Archives

Previous issues from 1998 through Winter 2006 will eventually be available in a dedicated archive section. Prior to 1998, the Proof Sheet was printed and mailed to members. Thanks to Ann Wiley, those issues have been scanned and will soon be available online as image files. Selected articles will be converted to text and reprinted here as blog entries.

Questions?

If you have any questions or comments about the Proof Sheet, please contact the editor, Kat Nagel.