Publishing your kids’ photos online
There’s this phrase that I really like, and which I try to use regularly with parents: digital hygiene. Basically, yes, it’s unlikely that you’ll contract a horrible disease if you don’t wash your hands on the way out of the restroom, but it’s a good habit to have, and it’s a simple step that can prevent a lot of pain down the road.
A few years ago I was reading a crime novel involving kidnapping rings. One of the kidnappers would get requests for children, often with specific feature sets, like ‘blonde kid with curly hair and brown eyes,’ and then he would troll the web looking for an image that matched, figure out where the kid lived, and heist the kid. I think that’s remarkably unlikely.
People need to be careful about posting images of their children online, but not because there’s a real likelihood that someone will abduct your child based on their published cuteness. What it comes down to is that if you post the picture, there is nothing stopping anyone from coming along and copying the image and editing it or re-using it. Most likely, it would be done to harass the parent, and it is incredibly upsetting for parents and family members to see images of their kids edited inappropriately or re-used in a way that seems threatening.
There’s very little legal support for parents and families when this happens. Were you to find your child’s image on a site that rates kids for pedophiles, for instance, your legal recourse would be dependent on things like where the web site was hosted, where the publisher of the website lived, and where you live. In many cases, there may be enough cause to file a police report, but not enough for the police to be effective in getting resolution.
My guidance is to post images of your kids in an authenticated environment, where you can control who views the pictures. Ensure that you’ve removed all of the metadata from the file (such as GPS coordinates), and be mindful of whether there are street signs or clear addresses shown in the image.
And, because it’s not transparent to your kids, talk to them about what you’re doing and why. They see you practice good hygiene when you’re washing your hands before preparing dinner, so talk to them about the various ways you practice good digital hygiene.
Tacoma Safe Child Town Hall
May 25 is National Missing Children’s Day. In observance of this day, CommunityWatch is hosting a Safe Child Town Hall meeting in Tacoma. We have a assembled a phenomenal speaker list for this public event:
Attorney General Rob McKenna
Mockingbird Society – youth speaker
Melissa Lee – Get Game Smart at Microsoft
Linda Criddle – online safety advocate and founder of Look Both Ways
Miguel Villahermosa – Director of Secondary Education for Tacoma Public Schools
Partners include Take 25 (part of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children), and the Washington State PTA.
The town hall will be held in Tacoma and Mount Tahoma High school, from 6-8pm, doors opening at 5:30.
More information about speakers can be found at http://communitywatch.us/townhall.html
- We know that a town hall that is happening next week is not news.
- We know that whether it is news or not, people want to hear this story: Youth advocate from the foster system standing on stage with the Attorney General of Washington State, to talk about leadership and courage.
- We know that across Washington state, people are dealing with trauma caused by predatory crime – street violence, domestic violence, destructive behaviors that seem beyond control, and that are shown to cause generational victimization and crime cycles.
- We know that those cycles of crime and trauma can be ended.
CommunityWatch works to educate, empower, and end the cycle of predatory crime.
Can you identify these people?
On March 10, 2010, the photographs of serial killer Rodney Alcala, now 66, were found in a Seattle storage locker.
These photos depict people who were alive and apparently unhurt at the time the photographs were taken. They surely didn’t realize they were posing for a serial killer. The police have been unable to determine if any of these people are also victims of this man, who was sent to prison in 1979 for the kidnapping and murder of a 12-year-old girl.
Please take a few minute and look through photographs on the website linked below. If you recognize anyone, please use the contact information (either phone and email) provided and give them that information.
Of all the tragedies that a family can go through, the disappearance of a loved one is likely at the top. By naming these people and hopefully providing a current location for them, we can better utilize resources to investigating those that are still missing. Please help.
http://www.cbsnews.com/2300-504083_162-10002762.html?tag=page
Open letter of request to Gates Foundation
Hello,
As you may be aware, sex.com is coming up for auction on March 18. I, and others from the safety/security domain, would love it if the Gates Foundation would purchase this domain for use as a global safe-sex resource.
Through-out recorded history, safe-sex has been a loaded concept. Violence, exploitation, disease and more – are global issues affecting every strata of every society. Now, with blogging and media saturation, we have seen the extensive and horrific results of sex trafficking, exploitative cultural norms, increased sexual abuse of women and minors during conflict, and ignorance about basic safe-sex practices.
One website (+ a lot of money and smart people) could provide world-wide best practices for every country. Like the CIAs World Fact Book + Planned Parenthood.
Stephen Balkam from FOSI (the Family Online Safety Institute) tweeted about it today, which is the first I’d heard of the domain going up for sale. Bidding starts at 1million, and will likely go much higher, as the opportunity for revenue is truly immense.
I appreciate any time or consideration that you give to this request, and am of course at your disposal for any questions, comments, or suggestions.
Regards,
Child Security: Risk vs. Threat
Children are primarily faced with safety threats: car seats improperly fastened, parents on the phone while driving, and un-gated stairs leading to severe falls are all examples. Some of those threats can be neutralized: ensure the car seat is properly fastened, turn off the phone while driving, and install a gate at the top and bottom of the stairs.
What those threats have in common is that there’s no intent behind them—mom is not intentionally causing a car-wreck by talking on the phone on the way to the grocery, and the car-seat wasn’t sabotaged. While these instances might lead to tragic consequences, they’re much easier for us to deal with because there’s no predatory element involved.
Introduce that predatory element and many people lose perspective. I hear a lot of comments involving “monsters preying on unprotected children,” to which I reply, “They’re not monsters, they’re cowards, and you can protect your kids even if you’re not with your kids: teach them!”
Read the rest at Neighborhood Crime Map
RSO sentencing reform – what can you do?
This was extracted from a letter to a supporter in California, who had asked what could be done about dealing with violent sex offender policy/law.
There are two avenues to approach this issue: education of communities, families, and kids; or legislative reform. We work to these things in combination, as they’re both essential to any kind of lasting community security.
What is specifically addressed in this tragic issue is sentencing reform: how long should what kind of criminal stay in prison, and how should they be monitored upon release.
In our opinion, what is most effective is a sentencing matrix. It takes the details of the crime, criminal’s past offenses, and psychiatric evaluation, and determines the likelihood of re-offense upon release. This helps make decisions about how long they should remain in prison, in community custody, and what level of monitoring they should have upon release.
The real work comes from putting enough constant, constructive pressure on the legislature to get them to spend the money. People tend to stop talking about RSO laws as soon as the crisis is out of the media, which can often cause the legislature to make small, cosmetic changes rather than effective, sustainable change. More space in prisons, more evaluation of criminals, more oversight of violent offenders, and cost of actual legislative and policy change is pricey.
What I would suggest? Have your friends over for an interesting and constructive discussion. Serve snacks, put up a white board, and figure out a plan of action. Ask everyone to commit to working on this for three weeks, three months, six months or a year. You all can go out to your respective PTAs, church groups, etc., from there, and do the same thing. This is remarkably effective, constructive, and allows every voice to be heard. After some set amount of time, have your original group back again, and invite your legislators. In the invitation, tell them what you’ve done so far. Invite the local media.
As an aside – I’m an informed citizen and a mom. That’s all I have to recommend me for this position, and what I just described is what we did three years ago, and we have had an incredible journey so far.
Rational discussion aids reporting
Originally published 10/14/2008
There’s a steep learning curve for many when they start working in child safety/security. For most, it takes a bit of work to transform from being an emotional parent to being a rational citizen. About air quality? Sure, most people can manage a dispassionate discussion. About child rape? Not so much.
A lot of things used to get said, like: “That person is just evil- a monster,” or, “If anyone ever hurt my child like that, my husband would kill them!”
Here’s the point of the post:
Whether or not evil exists is a fascinating conversation. The existence of this type of abuse, and the extremes to which it can be carried, may indicate the existence of evil; I don’t know. But child abusers themselves are not evil. They’re cowards, they’re sick, they’re twisted, they have chemical imbalances coupled with weak characters and poor impulse control… but they’re not evil.
When we call them ‘evil’ or [to a lesser extent] ‘monsters’, we’re creating a mystery around them and making them seem even scarier than they are. When a child hears a parent talking about abusers that way, the kid is thinking that, no matter what the parent says, there’s not a thing mom or dad can do about the evil guy, that you’re not big enough or mean enough to deal with monsters. There’s a good chance that the child is going to try and protect his/her parents from the evil monsters by not telling the parent what’s happening.
The same thing holds true for statements involving ‘killing’ those who abuse our kids. Personally, I think my head might explode from wanting to, but I’ve learned not to say it because – as one of my children pointed out to me [ouch] – if I kill that person, then I’ll be in jail, and they won’t have me as a parent.
The unifying theme to both these points: The reality of child abuse is so overwhelmingly and explosively emotional that neutral and calm language is necessary in order to help ensure that the facts get shared. If the worst happens and a child is abused or assaulted, the child needs to know that the parent/trusted adult is able to safeguard them from more harm, and to handle the information without getting arrested.
Otherwise, they may be more willing to tolerate further abuse than to potentially worsen the situation by having their parents in danger or in jail. Sounds horrific, but it’s not uncommon.
Barring RSOs from attending Church
Originally published 10/11/09
Banning RSOs from attending Church in North Carolina
What is the expected, constructive result of legislation banning RSOs from attending church? Even from banning RSOs from being within 300 feet of any location that has the primary purpose of dealing with minors – What is the expected goal?
The fact is that the US is tagging a lot of people as RSOs, and they do have to live somewhere. You cannot reasonably expect them to live outside a 300-1000 foot range of every church, preschool, day care, public school, bus stop, or private school in any given city, town, or unincorporated area. What that would bring you would be a lot of unstable, homeless, RSOs living under bridges or in their car, parked in the lot near the local playground.
Many areas have Community Protection Zones that intelligently prohibit level 3 offenders (the most predatory, with a very high risk of re-offense) from living within a certain distance of, for instance, public schools.
This idea of “Not in my back yard” is not a good idea. You’re not doing your community a favor by trying to force RSOs to live ‘elsewhere.’ There is no ‘elsewhere’ – someone is going to have to deal with the issue, and by passing these laws, people are essentially foisting the issue onto someone else, likely someone who doesn’t have the means to monitor the safety of their kids/community as effectively.
Please remember- the vast majority of sexual assaults are not committed by RSOs - they’re committed by uncaught, unidentified offenders who have established positions in your community. Teach your kids to be safe and they’ll be safe just about anywhere, whether RSOs are allowed in the same church or not.
Free Range Kidlets
Originally published 10/15/09
When we started the non-profit in 2006, we were told that children were at extreme risk from strangers, and that thousands and thousands of kids go missing every single day in the US. We had law enforcement, safety experts, and children’s books expound on these two ideas, and we were pretty sure it was our job to let parents know that, too.
We were wrong, and we figured it out pretty quick, thankfully.
We want our kids to be safe, to grow up safe, and to learn how to keep themself safe so they’re prepared for any situation. The skills they need to do that are like a toolbox, and one of the most important tools in that box is CONFIDENCE.
How do you give your kid confidence? It’s pretty simple:
- 1) Teach your kid what they need to know,
2) Let them loose in the appropriate environments, and
3) Absolutely support them.
Teaching your kid what they need to know means that you need to know it: not be oblivious, or overly scared yourself. It might be different in one neighborhood than in another, different for one kid than another. Some things don’t change: Kids need to travel in pairs of 2 or more. Kids need to know what appropriate behavior is and is not. Kids need to know how to ask for help – from a stranger or from a family member.
The appropriate environment is not so easy to determine, but there are some ways to do it. One of our favorites is Gavin de Becker’s Test of Twelve. When your kid is very tiny, start teaching toward this test, and maybe your kid will be ready to go around the neighborhood when they’re 11. Or 8. It depends on you and your kid and your neighborhood.
This is difficult for another reason – a lot of parents were assaulted as kids. Might be difficult to make a non-emotional decision about it if when you were 9 you were assaulted at the park, and never told your parents because you didn’t want to lose your freedom. I hear stories like that every week or so. The only answer I have for that is - Be free range with your kid. Develop a sense of what’s normal for the park at 2:30 pm, or for 8:30 am. Know your neighbors, and know your kid has confidence in his or her neighborhood and ability to travel around the neighborhood.
And that last one – support them. If something happens -anything- then you need to be calm, supportive, and listen to your kid.
Your kid is most at-risk from cars, poorly adjusted car-seats, and no bike-helmet, not from perverted strangers. Make sure the topic is on the table, make sure your kids know you’ll be calm and trust them as needed, and make sure they have the appropriate safety gear and security training. Let them loose.
Here’s a link to a blog that’s all free range, all the time – some perspective: Free-Range Kids.
Justice and the Bar
Originally published 10/22/09
One of the projects CommunityWatch has had for a few years is working with the Washington State Bar Association to correct their process for dealing with criminal charges against members of the Bar. They’re a large organization with complicated bylaws, and change takes time.
It’s worth it, though, to ensure that we can have some measure of faith in the value and integrity of the Bar, and in the justice that is delivered to us through members of the Bar.
Members of the Bar are human, and cannot be expected to be other than human, with human weaknesses. There is one thing that separates members of the Bar from the rest of us: our justice is delivered through them. Will we go to prison or will the charges be dropped? Are the charges even legitimate? How can you tell? What are your rights – do you know? What does justice look like? Will you recognize it when it’s presented to you as an option requiring an immediate decision?
Justice is the voice of the Constitution articulated from a distance of hundreds of years, and colored by thousands of trials and recorded decisions. Just is not the same as fair, it’s not always pleasant, and the path to justice is not necessarily straight and simple.
Citizens of the US and of WA cannot hope to naviage the complexities of the justice system without assistance, and for that assistance we must rely on and trust in the intellect, courage, and integrity of members of the Bar, and of the Bar itself.
Bethan
