Archive for November, 2010
Internet Safety Smart Holiday Shopping How-To’s
The next month or so is a prime time for cyber criminals to target those who are trying to save a few bucks on their holiday shopping. Most of us are familiar with the spam emails that tell us we can “SAVE 50% OFF (insert product)!!”, but during the holidays more people are inclined to [...]
Is Facebook’s Vibe Pushing Away College Students?
What if someone told you that the college crowd is slowly migrating away from Facebook? What do you think would be the cause? There are some obvious reasons, as Rebecca Collins points out in her recent article on TechFlash.com. For starters, college kids probably aren’t very fond of the fact that there’s been a huge [...]
How to Have a Safe iPod Touch and a Happy Kid
The number one thing that my 10-year-old son wanted for his birthday this year was an iPod Touch. My husband and I haven’t allowed him a cell phone just yet, and won’t for quite a while, so we figured this would be a good way to see how responsible he’d be with the technology. We [...]
Sexting Goes Mainstream
Sexting is no secret to anyone who hasn’t been living under a rock for the last five years. It’s becoming more problematic every day as more and more kids are given smart phones but not the education and rules that should come with it. Today, you can turn on your TV and see that sexting [...]
The Aftermath of the Google Street View Privacy Breach
Online privacy concerns and violations are becoming more and more common every day. In Google’s case—and Facebook’s as well—these privacy concerns stem mainly from the way these companies practice their business, i.e. the way they make money and the way they’re able to offer their services for free. And though these practices aren’t actually any [...]
Facebook Ignores COPPA – Yoursphere Law Enforcement Team Member Speaks Out
In order to do what we do for kids online, we had to put together a dream team of managers, developers, designers, and writers. But unlike most social networks, we added another layer of expertise and skills by bringing on a law enforcement team that strongly believes in creating a safer Internet for kids, and [...]
People I Admire – Dave and Bill from CyberHood Watch
Dave and Bill from CyberHood Watch haven’t only been huge supporters of Yoursphere and what we’re doing to pioneer the way for a safer and more positively focused Internet, but they’ve had an extremely impactful voice in the Internet safety realm for the past three years. Having children of their own, Dave with five and [...]
Apple’s Anti-Sexting Application Has Potential, but Can’t Replace Parents
You may have heard of Apple’s recent patent on a technology that will allow the company to censor incoming and outgoing “sext” messages on the iPhone. And though it’s only an idea at this point, it’s a noteworthy one considering the exponential effect it can have, granted that it works the way that Apple intends [...]
Poll Shows Parents Want Updated Privacy Laws, but Unaware of COPPA
Last month, Common Sense Media (CSM) got together with chairmen from the FCC and the FTC to discuss the results of their latest children and online privacy poll. The main focus of the poll was to see where parents and other adults stood on the business of data gathering and targeted advertising by third-party firms, [...]
Mary Kay is a nationally-recognized Internet safety expert, and the founder of 
