11-year old Seeing Porn on His Xbox is Also Parents Fault
Today a report came from NBC about a mother who is outraged that her son received pornogrpahic pictures over Xbox Live. The obvious truth is that the person who sent it is at fault, but so is the mother. Apparently she inst aware of parental controls.
The NBC article:
NBC -- A Texas mother is outraged after her 11-year-old son was sent pornography by an online gamer he met while playing his Xbox. "When they are playing against their friends, it's a controlled environment," explained mom Rosie Garcia. "But when they join a party, it can be someone in Japan, Australia, anywhere in the world."
Rosie's son sent a message to one of those players challenging him. She says that player then sent her son the pornographic pictures. Rosie immediately called the San Antonio Police Department. She also called Xbox and gave them the GamerTag information on the accused predator. Rosie didn't stop there. She also went online and filed a complaint on the Xbox page. This can only happen to your child if you pay for the Xbox online service. If it happens to anyone in your family, the FBI encourages you to report it.
NBC
The article does not say what exactly the child received. I am assuming it was a picture of the sender (likely male) naked.
So the mother is obviously quite pissed off about this. As she should be. She is going the whole way with this, calling foul on Xbox and Microsoft with multiple complaints. All that work could have been saved if she would have simply used the parental controls offered on the Xbox Live child account settings. Microsoft Support explains how to do this:
To configure your child's communications settings for Xbox LIVE, follow these steps:
1. In the System section of the Xbox Dashboard, select the Family Settings option.
Note If you are using the Xbox 360 console for the first time, you can select the Family Settings option on the initial Setup Complete screen.
2. Select the Xbox Live Controls option, and then sign in by using the password for your Windows Live ID.
3. Select the Privacy and Friends option, and then select Communications.
4. Select one of the following settings:
* Everyone: Select the Everyone option to allow your child to communicate with anyone on Xbox LIVE.
* Friends Only: Select the Friends Only option to allow your child to communicate only with people on his or her friends list.
* Blocked: Select the Blocked option to block everyone from communicating with your child.
The best option for parents would be "Blocked", simply because this ensures NO ONE can show or send your kid anything. For parents that monitor their child's friends on Xbox Live "Friends Only" would be a better choice. This way you can be sure you only let them have friends that you can moderate and know they should not send them anything inappropriate.
At the end of the day it is nearly impossible to stop your kid from being corrupted these days with out completely shutting off their independence. We all eventually see a naked woman/man but most parents don't want their kids to experience that till they are long out of their own home. For the parents that never want their children to see a naked body or hear a curse word just just block all content and stick your kid in a cage in the basement. However for the parents that just want to insure their child is safe just keep tabs on your kids gaming. Play with them, get to know their friends and just show interest in your child's gaming lifestyle.
Video games are a great medium in entertainment and offer so much fun and joy, please don't block your kid from that experience by never getting them a console or shutting out video games. Allow them to play if they want, just take the time from your day to monitor them and play with them.
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