Protect your child from spam mails

Spam is an issue for all of us, but it is an even more serious issue where children are concerned.

Symptoms

Your 12-year-old daughter is a heavy e-mail user. Lately, her account is inundated with spam, including free offers and even content that is completely unsuitable for children.

Prognosis

Children and teenagers are easy targets for spammers and phishers. This is because they use social networking sites and chat rooms, and may reveal their personal details, like e-mail IDs in such forums. This is one way in which spammers could get their IDs. Other ways are when they fill online contest forms, participate in online surveys, or even click links in e-mail to "unsubscribe" from a particular service, which is usually some spam.

Prevention

Speak to your children about the dangers of spam and phishing attacks. It’s better for them to have two e-mail IDs, one of which can be used for social networking sites and chats. As far as possible, e-mail and instant message IDs should not be revealed on social networking sites, chat rooms, and other such forums. Also ask your children to come to you before filling any online form, so that you can check the privacy policy and legitimacy of the site.

Make your children aware of the danger of clicking links in unsolicited e-mail or opening attachments without knowing what they are. Installing a Parental Control program on your machine would also help you keep your children away from objectionable sites that they’re introduced to via spam. Using complex e-mail addresses and strong passwords also helps to control spam by making it difficult for spammers to guess your account details.

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