Protecting Personal Information Q&A
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What is personal information?Personal information is any information or combination of information that enables an individual to be identified.Personal information may include:
- Full name
- Address
- Phone numbers
- School
- Date of birth
- Email addresses
- Username and password
- Pictures
How can parents help protect their students?(excerpt from www.commonsensemedia.org/blog/protecting-personal-privacy-online)- Explain that nothing is really private. No matter what kids think. Privacy settings aren’t infallible. It’s up to kids to protect themselves by thinking twice before they post something that could damage their reputation or that someone else could use to embarrass or hurt them.
- Teach kids to keep personal information private. Help kids define what information is important for them to keep private when they're online. We recommend that kids not share their addresses, phone numbers, or birth dates.
- Make sure your kids use privacy settings on their social network pages. Encourage kids to really think about the nature of their relationships (close friends, family, acquaintances, strangers) and adjust their privacy settings accordingly.
- Remind kids to protect their friends' privacy. Passing along a rumor or identifying someone in a picture (called "tagging") affects their privacy. If your kids are tagged in friends’ photos, they can ask to have the photos or the tags removed. But there’s not too much they can do beyond that.
- Establish a few hard-and-fast rules about posting. No nude or semi-nude photos or videos -- ever. Not online, not via mobile phone (known as "sexting"). No pictures of doing inappropriate activities.
- Remind kids that the Golden Rule applies. What goes around comes around. If kids spread a rumor or talk trash about a teacher, they can't assume that what they post will stay private. Whatever they say can come back to haunt them in more ways than they can imagine.
- Help kids think long term. Everything leaves a digital footprint. Whatever gets created may never go away. If they don’t want to see it tomorrow, they'd better not post it today.
Helpful Files
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Protecting Your Kids On-line
This is a flier from netsmartz.org to help guide parents with a few tips about online safety.
Helpful Links
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Netsmartz.org Site
This site is a national winner when it comes to teaching about online safety. The site has information for parents, educators, teens, tweens, and young children. -
Common Sense Media's Guide to Protecting Our Children's Online Privacy
The great people at Common Sense Media have put this part of their site together to help us as families do the right thing online to protect our children. -
Protecting Your Child's Privacy Online
This site talks about COPPA (The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act) and what you as a parent should understand about internet use by children under the age of 13. -
Fuax Paw's Adventures
This site link has a few movies about a techno cat named Faux Paw. Younger students will enjoy watching his mis-adventures while learning about being online. -
How to Keep Your Personal Information Secure
This is a site from the FTC on keeping all personal information secure. For our students online, check out the section about online security.