Last Friday, we had Karen Fedyszn of Fortium Partners present to us on the topic of protecting children and seniors online. We started with why digital protection is so important. The main areas we focused on are these; children can experience online bullying, cyber predators, and seniors can be taken advantage of.
Karen then led us through some suggestions on self-protection, starting with complex passwords. She also suggested that we keep separate personal and professional accounts to protect ourselves further. She also said that families should be extra diligent about who they let into their online life and avoid any profiles you do not actually know in person. Karen said wisely, “if your child is chatting with this person online, they should know them in real life.”
From there, we jumped right into the pros and cons of several social media platforms, starting with Instagram. While Instagram is a teen favorite and has a lot of benefits, parents should be wary that the average user age is 25-34. Karen wanted to reiterate that parents should not allow kids to tag themselves in posts as it gives away too much information. These suggestions followed a lot of other well-known platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and TikTok. Karen focused on the fact that parents should make sure their children and parents know that whatever goes online, stays online.
When it comes to our family’s online presence, we really cannot be too careful in protecting ourselves and the ones we love. Karen did a fantastic job presenting us with practical tips and real-life examples of the dangers of social media and how to ensure our families are aware of them. If you were unable to attend, you can view the slide deck here.