Church Techy
Where Tech meets Church
Spying On Our Children
Author: Stuart25 Aug
Lee over at ScamTypes has written a very good post about protecting our kids.
The one bit of advice I disagreed with is:
Whilst I think this is an important part of their development you may feel that you would like to keep an eye on them all the same, perhaps without them being aware of that fact.
If so then software such as Win-Spy Pro is what you will need as it affords the opportunity to remotely view another computer.
This includes what is viewed on their screen as well as what they type.
The program cannot be deleted or stopped by your kids and they will almost certainly be unaware if it is installed on their system.
You can even use the program to control a nearby webcam to see exactly what your child is doing!
Spying isn’t cool but sometimes its necessary to ensure the safety of those we love.
Now don’t get me wrong, there are certain things I understand and appreciate here such as the concern of individual parents (I am one as well) and the need to protect your children but – and maybe it’s the terminology used – spying is not the way forward in my book.
I commented to this effect on the post.
Not surprisingly someone has disagreed with me and I half expected that, but is that disagreement stemming from a point of ignorance or arrogance? I simply don’t know and I was going to answer that over at Lee’s blog but found my comment was heading towards the very large size and felt a post of my own would better put my response. Secondly I don’t want to come off as sounding like I’m accusing anyone either – because I’m not.
Let me be clear – each of us has to parent our children our way and each of us has should have to carry the can for our decisions good or bad. And I understand that parenting is hard.
But equally, each of us has an obligation to listen and learn and to ensure we are up on what is necessary to help guide, direct, mold and assist our children. In this specific area I have a bit to say and will continue to defend my corner on it. First though, why should anyone listen to me? Well …
- I’ve been in IT for >25yrs now
- I am a parent
- I was head of IT monitoring for >10,000 teenagers for over 4yrs.
- Whilst I’m not a total security freak I do have a lot of general knowledge in the area
Now, spying is an emotive subject whomever you are but from my perspective it can have ramifications on us as parents that we maybe aren’t ready to accept or cope with.
- Our child will likely react badly to the knowledge when they find out – and they will.
- It instills an instinctive lack of trust in them.
- It doesn’t bridge the child < > adult relationship at all.
- And who knows what later life decisions a child will blame on this!
Sorry, no mumbo-jumbo from me, I’ll leave that to the psychologists and their ilk.
Again let me clarify what I mean by spying: here I am referring to the underhanded “I’m not telling them about it until I have the evidence” approach.
I still hold that we shouldn’t spy on our children. yes, have talks, monitor them, restrict them, guide them, assist them – but the spying is not conducive to good family relationships. In my experience with teenagers (see above) they will find out and the backlash will be far worse than the initial problem one was trying to overcome.
So what is right?
Again each to their own but generally there are a few things that must happen.
- Discuss, discuss, discuss
- Educate ourselves
- Review
I don’t buy in to the adage of day to day computing being too hard for us to learn and understand.
I also don’t accept that our children will necessarily know more than us so what’s the point in trying. But even if they do end up knowing more, we have a duty to learn the basics.
I refer back to my point above – we have an obligation as a parent to learn and to continue learning. Just because I don’t know all the street names for drugs doesn’t relieve me from the duty of “trying” to educate my child about the possible dangers (this was, pre-parenthood, my number one fear over being a Dad). Equally, because I don’t know doesn’t absolve me of having to learn more.
- If I don’t know, then I ask.
- I use my peers.
- I use my colleagues.
- I use the internet.
- I use books (remember those?).
- I go on courses.
- etc …
And no, I’m not expecting you to become a Nuclear Physicist – that’s my teenager’s current dream – but in day to day, everyday life, we as parents are obliged (if not by law then morally) to continually educate ourselves so that we can have meaningful discussions and relationships with our children.
Spying doesn’t do that.
Enough said – what’s your opinion?
10 Responses for "Spying On Our Children"
Hi again Stuart.
First off I'd like to offer you some thanks, firstly for taking the time to comment on my original post and secondly for taking the time to write up such a lengthy account of your own views.
When I wrote my piece I didn't really think the spying issue would be picked up on but I can now see that it may prove to be quite an emotive subject.
To clarify, I do not and never have spied on my kids' internet activity just for the sake of it.
I laid down guidelines, I monitored and I spotted an issue with my middle child.
Without a parenting rule book to tell me what to do I took advice from my parents yeah, even us almost-40-somethings still do that) and spent a lot of time thinking.
I gave my son the benefit of the doubt and sat him down again, explaining why I wasn't happy with his actions and what he needed to change about his behaviour.
Unfortunately he chose not to listen and, with two other kids to monitor along with daily household chores, he was able to continue doing what he had done before without my knowledge for a while.
He broke my trust in him and could, potentially, have been putting himself in danger as he was broadcasting everything to the world – full name, address, age, times he would be at home and far more besides.
Considering he was antagonising people, especially girls with older brothers I knew I had to do something to put a stop to it.
I banned him from the internet for 6 months during which time I installed the tools necessary to record what he was up to.
If I had done that before he broke my trust then I would feel I was in the wrong.
As it was, a 6 month break changed him and he hardly uses his computer now anyway.
Instead he is on the xBox and all his communication with his friends is through the headset meaning I can hear every word.
I've protected my son and stopped him giving abuse to others.
Was I wrong?
I guess thats down to your point of view…
Lee – thanks for the comment. And in fact it puts an entirely different spin on your blog post.
Were you wrong – no (again my opinion), what you did is what I would have done – the only extra step you didn't mention that I would have done (and maybe you did) is to tell him I was doing this.
This is what I did with my teen – he didn't get 6mths though, just a few weeks although access in his room became magically crippled – I blamed it on other new (no lie) interfering wi-fi signals and he had to use the family computer instead.
Actually I did tell him what I was doing but not at first.
Whatever anyone may think of my motives, and the rights and wrongs of 'spying', I will always feel that I made the right decision.
I felt my son's safety was at risk (because of his own stupid actions) and felt I needed to secretly monitor the situation to ensure that he wasn't going to do it again.
Lee – I think that you and I are coming from the same side of the pitch here. I for one do NOT think any the worse of you.
My ego feels much better for knowing that! :D
I also see you're not a fan of Big Brother.. I likes ya!
[...] this type of attack is very much on the rise – it is, as I’ve maintained before (e.g. 1, 2), that we should learn about the hardware and software we use and understand what we need to do [...]
I just "caught" my teenage son having looked at internet content that was unacceptable again. I have told him from the beginning that I have the right and the obligation to check up on his internet use. And I do this periodically. He has tried to delete his internet history, but I know how to find out what he's been doing in spite of his deletions. And I have told him that also (I just don't tell him how I do it). Now he is banned from the computer for the summer.
In the mean time I am going to going to be spending more time with him away from the computer and helping him to strengthen his relationship with me and with God.
I don't think it is spying if you tell them ahead of time that everything they do on the computer is fair game for you to look into. Afterall it is my computer he is using, my house, my rules. Ugh! I sound just like my parents!
All of ya'll are super parents compared to me.
You want disagreements and intense discussion? Keep reading.
I agree with Stuart, without any criticism of Lee, that if you want to catch a kid doing something wrong, you can. I am more upfront and would tell them I am watching and there is nothing they can do about. They can either change their behavior or suffer the consequences, whatever form of punishment is best (taking it away, loss of privileges, or whatever).
Then if it happened again, I would punish them in one of those ways….right after I busted their butt.
And that's the key word(s) Richard – you told him ahead of time.
I'm with you on that, I don't think it's spying when you've said. The slight difference (maybe) that I take is that I've given my children a semblance of a right to privacy when it comes to their usage of the internet.
But I lik that you are taking action and that a part of that action is in trying to re-establish or build bonds.
Yeee ha! Thanks Kevin for the boost to my ego and I'm all for busting their butt's when needed!
I had a unique battle with my eldest (20 now) as he grew up because he was one of the 10,000 I "restricted" on a daily basis and his cionstant battle was to see if he or his friends could get around "Dad's roadblocks". But the silly boy never learnt and he just kept telling me whenthey had so that I could 'fix it' – as that's a key, no one solution is 100% effective.
Then one day he stopped telling me the details he just said we played games today or similar. Then he'd come home from school the next day and moan that the site was now blocked and "how did I know". Even though he's a Comp Sci student now I still haven't told him as us parents have to maintain an air of superhero status for as long as we can :)
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