need advice on Msn

[Gumby]

Talk to my brother in London for hours - free.

So did I, he said to say hello.

[old_picker]

I fix computers for a living and for me mSN messenger is just great.
I get lots of work from people who's kids use it...

if she attracts the attention of an idiot they have total control of your computer and possibly even your daughter

Ask yourself these questions
Are you happy for her to be chatting to strangers??
are you on top of computer security??
Is the computer in a public area??
Would she agree to and would you be prepared to supervise sessions??
Do you know how to access the chat logs??

If you answered yes to all of the above go right ahead.

Plenty of kids use MSN but so do plenty of adults and you dont know who is who as it is all anonymous if you want it to be. At least make sure the chat logs are on and keep them on so at least you can see what is going on. Also after MSN is installed make sure she is using a login account that doesn't have administrator privileges. IMHO she is a bit young yet to be getting into internet chat rooms

[SPIRIT]

l know good advice when l hear it thats why l asked email/hotmail address seems the way to go and wear my daddy hat am l right with this. realy have no idea but its my girl were talking about

[Clinton1]

I suppose a part of the question is if you say no, how will she respond to that?

When all her friends are on it and chatting continually, and she's left out and its all your fault .... there's the potential for a festering teenage sore!

If she is a good girl, well adjusted and has a good relationship with you and her mum, part of the 'security rules' will be her commonsense.

I reckon it will be hard to say no and still keep things on an even keel.... and lets face it, she will have as much chance of running across a predator there as at the shops.

What about a second computer for the net chatting, as a virus protection measure for your 'real' computer?

[Master Splinter]

The dangers of MSN - or any other chat client - are often overstated in comparison to reality, especially if your daughter is even sorta' sensible.

If you can train her to NOT click on the "Your PC is slow/infected/lacking in useful toolbar helpers/cute bears/pony wallpaper" ads, you are 95% there.

Using a modified hosts file to block ads helps with this. See here.

Viruses, trojans and the like - these will generally only get onto your computer via 'social engineering' - you have to be made to go to a particular web site for malicious content to actually run - and if you are using a safer browser (such as Firefox) you will more than likely be immune to it anyway, if it doesnt get nuked by your firewall. There's nothing specific to MSN in this regard.

Zone Alarm is a highly thought of firewall (and its free); I use Avast! anti virus (another freebie) and never had any problems.

Use something like Ad-Aware and Spybot from time to time - but dont freak at the number of things they may find - most are simply cookies which are used by websites to hold information between pages. Read/Google what it says and understand that many of them are harmless (just privacy concerns) and not malicious or harmful.

As for on-line predators - according to the statistics, your daughter is at more risk from other family members/family friends/teachers/clergy and possibly even senators in the US than from a random perve online, even when you include these efforts.

I would use a chat nick that does not indicate that she is female, just to avoid being pestered by looser n00bs from india or the middle east who immediately message "28/m/pakistan.....sened me yr photoe plz..u r so sxy" to anything remotely female sounding.

A throwaway email address (hotmail, yahoo, gmail or whatever) is useful, but I've never had a spam deluge to any of mine - and it's easy enough to kill-file any dropkicks.

Seeking ethical advice myself - when I'm wearing my daddy hat, and having a word to Mr 15 about the pics of bare nakkid' ladies on his PC (and its not even connected to teh intarwebs!!eleven!), is it alright to ask him for a copy of the nice ones?

[Wood Butcher]

Seeking ethical advice myself - when I'm wearing my daddy hat, and having a word to Mr 15 about the pics of bare nakkid' ladies on his PC (and its not even connected to teh intarwebs!!eleven!), is it alright to ask him for a copy of the nice ones?

Geez, talk about the technology age. When I was his age a couple of magazines under the bed was sufficient

[Shedhand]

When you say teenager Spirit, how old is she?

Because irrespective of her age you can safely assume that even though its difficult for you to believe so, she won't be as wide eyed innocent as you think or would like her to be. I have a daughter who's 35 now but when she was 13 I got a rude awakening when I stupidly thought she was an innocent. Cops at the door one night telling me she was found drunk at an adults party. We always did the right thing, taught right from wrong, open and honest about sexuality and relationships blah blah blah. You can't teach them everything - they have to learn somethings for themselves. Commonsense will protect her from net nasties and as others have said it is unlikely that she will be targeted provided she is sensible. The internet is a wonderful tool for learning, entertainment and social networking. Its a pity that the hand-wringing, wet-eyed, god bothering wowsers spend so much time and effort trying to censor activities and content which is freely available in libraries and newsagents anywhere in the case if the written word and any pub, parked car or beach in the case of human interaction.
Just don't let her meet any net contacts at the airport and she'll be pretty safe mate.
Cheers

[SPIRIT]

just back . everything is yellow or have l still got a hangover
drama still goes on little mis has pull in some reinforsments
yes all her friends have msn already and she is v/sensable really
better 1/2 beleaves sensable enough and so do l.. so its the viruse debate , l do thank everybody for thier input
she has used that this forum is just like a chat room

[echnidna]

this forum is just like a chat room

very close to it