Parents worry their kids are becoming internet zombies – what to do about it

Seven out of 10 American parents fear their children will become Internet zombies, according to a new study.

The study surveyed 2,000 American parents of school-age children and found that 64 percent are concerned about the amount of time their children spend online.

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Another two in three believe their child’s overall behavior has changed as a result of being online.

While 71 percent said they trust their child is mature enough to surf the Internet unsupervised, a quarter of parents believe a child should be in their teens before they let it.

Still, the average parent surveyed was letting their child surf the web independently by age 11.

In general, parents feel it is inevitable that their child will see something inappropriate online when they cannot monitor them (68 percent) or when they are at school or doing homework/work online (71 percent).

Parents are also concerned that their child may receive messages from strangers (43 percent) or accidentally access inappropriate content (39 percent).

Conducted by OnePoll on behalf of Lightspeed systemsa platform for online safety and analytics solutions, the survey found that it’s not uncommon for parents to monitor their child’s online activities by asking their child to show them what they’re doing, or parental controls on the devices set (each 40 percent). ).

Likewise, 38 percent conduct random checks of their children’s Internet history, and 37 percent require all devices to be handed in before bed.

Almost half said they caught their child online or on social media when they were asked to do homework (49 percent), and even more believe their child tells them to do homework or research for school, to keep going the Internet (63 percent).

Of those whose children have a school-issued device, more parents feel they know less about the websites their child visits on those devices than they do about personal ones (66 percent vs. 75 percent).

As a result, almost all of these parents would choose to have their child’s school use monitoring software on these devices to detect interactions with worrying or inappropriate online content (90 percent).

“It is important for parents to talk about internet safety with their children to ensure they are as safe as possible online.

“Although 64 percent of parents tried, many reported finding it difficult to get the message across,” said Brian Thomas, CEO of Lightspeed Systems.

“Schools rely on our AI-based software and human review team to ensure they can spot warning signs of mental health issues and intervene before an incident occurs.

“Last school year we issued over 300,000 self-harm and violence alerts.”

And that same percentage already trust the school’s ability to monitor online activity, with a whopping 92 percent of parents admitting they rely on the school’s vigilance.

Three out of four of the parents whose child has a school-issued device said they have experienced a situation where the school has alerted them to inappropriate or dangerous behavior while monitoring the device.

“That may be why the majority of parents (72 percent) said they would like their child’s school to contact them about online behavior,” Thomas continues.

“Recently, one of our clients told us that 87 percent of our notifications to her district were for students who were not known to have mental health problems and who otherwise would not have received the help they needed.”

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