The car, the printing press and the World Wide Web
Embracing technology and enabling our children to surf safely

Ain’t technology brilliant! As well as providing me with a living for 15 years it enables us all to have access to more information than ever before. By using the internet we can find information about anything. If I wanted to know what song The Beatles played last at Shea Stadium in 1965 it would be a mere click away, or how about a good recipe for scones? The internet is an amazing tool and it can and should be used by everyone from school children to grandparents and all those in between.

But like any tool there are some safety precautions we need to take first; I wouldn’t dream of making scones without an apron or using a chain saw without safety trousers and I certainly wouldn’t consider browsing the internet without making sure I was adequately protected from the nasties out there.

Like the car and the printing press plenty of people want to spread fear and misinformation about the unknown dangers of this new evil internet beast, but the beast can be tamed and stroked and used to get what you need.

As a bare minimum make sure you have adequate security installed on your computer. If you have an industry standard ‘firewall’ and antivirus software running you can be assured that most, if not all threats will be unable to harm your computer. This software doesn’t cost the earth and there are very good free versions available, despite what the software companies say. Also please use common sense when putting any personal information into websites, look for the security padlock in your browser and don’t use sites that you know nothing about.

For parents, let your children explore the internet and use its vast banks of information to grow their minds and their interests, but be aware of the sites they visit. Ideally use the inbuilt parental controls in most browsers, again free, or use software to limit the websites they can use to known safe sites.

Let’s embrace the internet, responsibly and like intelligent people not like the luddites and naysayers of the past. Let’s face it if it wasn’t for the printing press we wouldn’t have twenty Katie Price autobiographies..........errrr

Your Steyning
http://www.yoursteyning.co.uk

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