Denise’s thoughts: I feel that is more than reasonable. You should also look into setting the limits with her about her account. For instance, who is she allowed to email or who is allow to be on her blog. In our home this is restricted to people my teen’s know in real life. My oldest is 17-years-old and has no problem with this. You’ll need to spend some time talking with her and coming up with the expectations, rules and consequences.
While these type of social sites can be awesome for kids to keep in touch and socialize with friends(people they already know), you need to be diligent in monitoring what your teens are doing. It took me 3 seconds to find a real sick person's profile, who was acting like a 13-year-old girl and I just reported it to CyberTipLine. I wasn't looking for this, it was the first link I clicked off of the front page.
From our Community: What do you think? Have you set up the rules for internet social site use? What are they? Share your thoughts, experiences and advice in the forum or in the comments section.
Mothers and Daughters Blog Carnival
• Stumble It! • Digg This! • Save this to Del.icio.us • 
Furl it • Reddit
I completely agree with Denise. My 17 year old daughter and 13 year old son both have my space accounts. The only way they can continue to have them is if I am on their friend list and can access their account, see what’s been posted, even read correspondence. We’ve been doing this for over a year and it has worked well for us^_^
When my daughter was 13, I found her full name in her blog online – public profile. That was against one of the rules I was very clear about.
I pulled her hard drive out of her computer for six months.
She was 13 – didn’t fully understand the dangers of what she had done, only that it was her favorite place to socialize with friends at the time.
At 13, she doesn’t have to understand, but she does have to follow the rules. Or lose the priviledge.
You need to know what your child is doing online, right up until the time they grow up, move out and pay for their own Internet connection. There are no implied privacy rights–certainly not when it comes to what they’re doing online. I do not believe its unreasonable to have full access to email accounts or private blogs..nor to track their URLs when they surf, if you choose. I would never punish a child for being on a site they shouldn’t be on…although I would ask them about it. And, did they realize i could see everywhere they’d been on the Net? Or log their keystokes so I knew what they were typing to friends?
Just telling them that goes a long way toward keeping them on right track…and away from the wrong places.
One “trick” to watch out for with teenagers. Many create two pages; one for mom and dad to see, and one for their friends. Also absolutely make sure they set their profile as private.
One of the most important things with children and teenagers is to have the home PC in the family room and NEVER in their bedroom
I encountered the problem mentioned by Whit with one of my teen-age sons. He had two “spaces.” I won’t go into how I discovered the other one but it upset me greatly to think he had puposely deceived me this way.
At that point in time, all of our children had access to my computer and their fathers with an account of their own on each of our computers – both computers being in our home offices.
We were giving them the benefit of the doubt until they gave us reason not to -possibly naive on our part, but we chose to extend that level of trust with the understanding that it would be taken away if we were given any reason by any of them (we have four teens)to question it.
Needless to say, because of my son’s actions, none of our kids are allowed to use our computers at this point unless we are in our office with them – and our offices are not that big, so the possibility of them doing ANYTHING without our knowledge is impossible right now.
Our children have never had their own computer, as a lot of kids do, and they never will – unless they pay for it themselves. As far as I am concerned, my children have no privacy as long as they live in my house, which is also the reason why none of their bedroom doors have locks.
I think that it is important for kids (my daughter is 12) to have a bit of privacy, but with the knowledge that it is not their inalienable right, but a privilege earned with honesty and responsibility. However, there is NO privacy online. You can mark a page “private” but it is child’s play for someone who wants to access that page to get around it. We told our daughter that anything she puts out into cyberspace is the same as posting it on a bulletin board, and it can stay out there forever. Since privacy online is a fallacy, she understands that we are not invading hers to make sure that she is not compromising her safety online. If she wants to have a private conversation with a friend, she can call them or talk to them in person. And just to have an extra “Jimminy Cricket” on her shoulder, we do have a keystroke program on our computer.
OK firstly bebo’s rules and regulations consist of not allowing anybody under the age of 13 to join. This world can be just as dangerous as public social networking sites. Yes i would agree if your child was under the age of 14 i wouldn’t allow them to have bebo for the simple reason that they are too young to fully understand the risk and dangers. But a mature 14+ year old should be entitled to use bebo. Otherwise your not allowing them to have thire own independence and your not setting them up to be responsible people.
Sid.
14
the extent to which parents control teenagers lives is ridiculous. when are they supposed to grow up, get freedom and responsibilities? teens don’t need to be monitored every moment of their lives (and wont want to either)…especially for ages 16 and up. think about it this way…when you were their age you wouldn’t want this. it seems unjust and unreasonable.
You can make a naive comment like that now, Isabella. Wait until God forbid your child is lured away from you by some psychopath who trolls these sites waiting for a vulnerable child whose parent has YOUR attitude…
the same rules dont apply now that we had when we where ‘their age’. New dangers lurk. We didnt have access to computers when were ‘their age’. We didnt have the concerns of cyber predators on our children. As a parent i have the responsibility & duty to make sure my children are safe whether it be knowing where they are, who they spend their time with or who they chat to online. Its my duty as a parent to know these thing whether they like it or not. They may see it at unfair at the time, but its when they get older & wiser & they become parents that they realise we did the right thing.
I agree with Sid and Isabella, a mature 14 and older should have that right to her/his privacy, yea tell teach them the dangers about it (like we should do for anyone thats unaware) but to monitor??? would you snoop in there draws ect??? they have that right to there privacy ect…
What you all seem to be forgetting is that any teenager from the age of 14 and up who is unintelligent enough to even make contact or correspond with someone they don’t know shouldn’t even be allowed outside their own home, this is baisically the same principal, you wouldn’t follow your child if he or she was outside with their friends for the day, so why moniter every one of their personal dealings and correspondances online.
Childeren from the age of 14 and up, often have a very tight knit circle of friends that they would consider their best friends and every one of their other friends from school for example may not be in regular contact
Children need their privacy, but the level of pricacy they are being given online is shambolic, as i have previously stated it is the same principal as controlling exactly who your child talks to in school or in their social peer groups and controlling exactly what they say. Of course you want what’s best for children, but maybe you don;t know what may be best for them, or you aren’t entirely sure. Don’t give your children free reign onlone but onl;y monitor their correspondance once a month
Sam
17
Okay I’m 15 now and this is just coming from a kid’s point of view.
We don’t mind if you occasionally check up on us or take a look at our history once in a while, but when our parents install keystroke programs and actually make an account on bebo and CONSTANTLY check up on us…We start to get a little worried and annoyed.
I think you should trust your child enough to not have to install some keystroke program, a kid is supposed to grow up, and I mean making your own account isn’t just only invading your child’s privacy, but all of their friends privacy as well and you must have something a little bit more constructive to do than go on teens networking site and practically stalk your son or daughter.
Your kid is gonna move out eventually and you have to accept that because from what I’ve just read, if my parents were that over protective, I’d be a very dull person. So I suggest giving them a bit more privacy because honestly, if you were there age and your parent’s did that to you I’d doubt you would enjoy it.
TC! Jasmin
15.
And excuse my poor grammar and spelling in the comment above, it was very rushed ><
Also this comment is at Lauren, out of so many children in the world using Bebo, your child HAS to be the one to be lured away by some maniac psychopath? If your child’s profile is set on private I doubt the “psychopath” of this sort would attempt to make contact with your son or daughter than if he/she’s profile was set on public.
Let your kid have their little moment of freedom, what’s the good of being a kid without having a little bit of fun, even if it is just social blogging over the internet!