Safety tips for E-Mail users

Teens in Europe say that this is good advice – especially for users.

• Only give your email address out to people you already know and trust – not to people you have only met online. Be careful that your email address is not in your profile or on other websites where people you don’t know can find it.
• Respect your friends. Don’t give out their email addresses without their permission – and never use emails to bully or manipulate others.
• Keep a record. If somebody is bullying or harassing you via email, then keep the email and don’t delete it. You don’t need to read it, just save it in a folder, even your junk folder. It may help you to find out who is sending the messages if you don’t already know, and it will definitely make the situation easier to explain to someone when you tell them. Keep the email until you have discussed how to stop it with somebody you trust. And do tell someone about it.
• Tell someone if you receive a message or messages that are bullying, or make you feel uncomfortable or at danger. Tell your parents, or a teacher or counsellor at school. Even telling your friends can help. There are organisations where you can receive advice anonymously, such as Perivian Net against Child Pornography which you can reach on http://www.red.org.pe/ or sending an email to denuncias@red.org.pe. If the message or messages you have received are threatening or harassing then you should tell your local police.
• Learn how to block/ignore people
• Change your email address if blocking doesn’t work and you are still receiving messages from someone you do not want to get messages from.
• Have more than one account. Use a personal one for friends and family for example. If you have to give an email address for entering a competition or registering for a service, it is a good idea to use a different address to your personal one, as this may lead to you receiving a lot of unwanted spam mail for example.
• Never open attachments from people you don’t know. Sometimes viruses might be sent unknowingly in attachments from your friends and family – check with the person who sent it if you are unsure about an attachment they sent.
• Don’t click on any links in spam. You do not know where you will end up, and it will make you vunerable to receive viruses.
• Don’t forward spam on to your friends, no matter how threatening it is or what you have been promised.

To reduce the amount of Spam you get:

• Choose an email address that is difficult to guess, i.e. a series of numbers and letters. It is best not to have any identifying information in your email address, such as full name, age, or location.
• Don’t put your email address anywhere on the Internet, in a profile or on a personal website for example. It is worth using a separate account to your personal one when entering competitions or other things online that require an email address.
• Only give out your personal email address to family and friends.
• Never reply to spam. Even if it says ‘unsubscribe’ or ‘Be removed from the list’ do not reply, as it may just confirm your email address to the sender and may mean you get even more spam!
• Spam filters or junk mail filters can offer some protection by diverting suspected spam into a junk mail folder – ask your provider about this.

How to block users

For whatever reason you may wish not to receive emails from a particular person anymore. If this is so you can block this person. How you do this may depend a little on your provider.

• In some programmes there is a ‘block’ button actually in your inbox.
• You block someone by highlighting or checking the box next to their email and then clicking on the Block button. This means that all emails from the address you blocked will not reach your inbox.
• In other programmes you need to add someone to a blocked senders list which will mean that you won’t see emails from this person again in your inbox.
• To do this you right click on the name of the person in the contact list which should give you a range of options, and one of these is Junk or even Block.
• Clicking on this will bring up the option of adding this person to your Blocked Senders List. By clicking this it means that you will not receive messages from this person anymore.
• Block is sometimes called ’Ignore’, and if right-clicking doesn’t work, have a look in your Preferences for this function.
• If you are not sure on how to block people in your programme then ask your provider about this.

Safety tips for online gamers

How to keep save on a gaming site online?

• There is no difference between chatting on a gaming site and on a chat site - so check the info about safe chat!
• Be careful who you trust online and remember that online friends are really strangers. People you are playing with online, no matter how long you have been chatting to them or how friendly they are, may not be who they say they are.
• Meeting someone you have only been in touch with online can be dangerous. If you feel that you ‘have to’ meet, then for your own safety you must tell your parent or carer and take them with you – at least on the first visit – and meet in a public place in daytime.
• Stay in charge in chat. Keep your personal information secret in the online game, in the profile and in chat (name, address, telephone number, mobile number, private email address, picture), even if people ask for this. Although it can be tempting to reveal more than you normally would in online friendships, giving out personal information can make you vulnerable.
• Look after each other. Don’t give out your friend’s personal information online as it could put them at risk. Look after and respect your friends while you are online.
• Think about your username or ‘handle’. Use a nickname, not your real name, and a nickname that is not going to attract the wrong type of attention.
• Learn how to block another player. If another player is behaving badly and annoying you then you should block them so you don’t hear from them again.
• You can always kick someone out of the game if they are making you feel uncomfortable.
• If there is voice chat on the game, sometimes you can disguise your voice by using a voice mask – these will make you sound different, like a robot for example. If you don’t want people to know your age or gender, this may be useful.
• But be careful using voice chat. It may feel like you are talking over the phone, but remember that you are chatting to a stranger. It is still important to keep safe and not give people your personal information while talking to them.
• Learn how to report another user. If another player is making you feel uncomfortable, by harassing you for personal information for example, then you should report them to the games provider.
  Learn how to keep a record, and keep any key information. It’s easier to explain a problem if you can show it.

How to keep a record?

While the worrying conversation is visible on the screen, create a picture of the screen:

• Push the button “print screen” on the keyboard.
• Open a word-document, right click and choose “paste” to insert the screen dump.
• Save the word-document with the records and show it to someone you trust

If it is not possible to copy the conversation, then keep a note of the date and time of the chat, the person’s username, and it may be useful to make a note of the names of other people who saw this person behaving in this way to you.

• If someone makes you feel really uncomfortable while you are playing then you should just leave the game.
• If you feel that a communication via an online game becomes dangerous for you, don’t hesitate to tell an adult. They might want to report to the police. The police know about online harassment and have ways of identifying criminals online.

Importan advises: Don't be a victim. How to keep save in chat?

How to keep save in chat?

• Be careful who you trust online and remember that online friends are really strangers. People online, no matter how long you have been talking to them or how friendly they are, may not be who they say they are.
• Meeting someone you have only been in touch with online can be dangerous. If you feel that you ‘have to’ meet, then for your own safety you must tell your parent or carer and take them with you – at least on the first visit – and meet in a public place in daytime.
• Stay in charge in chat. Keep your personal information secret when chatting online (name, address, telephone number, mobile number, private email address, picture), even if people ask for this. Although It can be tempting to reveal more than you normally would in online friendships, giving out personal information can make you vulnerable.
• Check your profile and make sure it doesn’t include any personal information (name, address, telephone number, mobile number, private email address, picture).
• Get away from an unpleasant situation in a chatroom by logging out (this just takes one click) or by changing your screen name.
• Think before you answer private messages. It can be harder to end a conversation in a private chat than in a public chat. A private chat may end up being more personal than you like.
• Use a nickname, not your real name, and a nickname that is not going to attract the wrong type of attention.
• Look out for your friends and do something if you think that they are at risk.
• Tell your parent or carer if someone or something makes you feel uncomfortable or worried.
• Learn how to keep/save a copy of the conversation in chat – this may be useful if you want to report something.
• Learn how to block/ignore people.
• Check you know how to report something you feel uncomfortable about to the chatroom provider or moderator.

How to save a copy of your conversations?

Saving your conversations can provide useful evidence if you come to make a report about something or someone.

• Highlight the conversation with your mouse.
• Copy the highlighted text.
• Paste the conversation into a Word document which you can save.

How to block users?

For whatever reason you may wish not to see messages from a particular person anymore or receive private messages from them. If this is so you can block this person.

• To do this you right click on the name of the person in the contact list which should give you a range of options, and one of these is Block.
• It will mean that you will not receive messages from this person anymore.
• Block is sometimes called ’Ignore’, and if right-clicking doesn’t work, have a look in your preferences for this function, or there may be a block/ignore button in the chatroom itself.

How to Report?

You can report people to the chatroom provider or moderator if they are breaking the rules.

• Keep a copy of the conversation that you want to report and send that in too.
• Look for a way to contact your chatroom provider or moderator by clicking the Help tab.

Resource: Chatdanger has been written by Childnet International, a charity registered in the UK (no. 1080173)