What Should You Do If You Suspect Your
Child Is Communicating With A Sexual Predator On-line?
1. Consider talking openly with your
child about your suspicions. Tell them about the dangers of
computer-sex offenders.
2. Review what is on your child's
computer. If you don't know how, ask a friend, coworker, relative, or
other knowledgeable person. Pornography or any kind of sexual
communication can be a warning sign.
3. Use the Caller ID service to determine
who is calling your child. Most telephone companies that offer Caller
ID also offer a service that allows you to block your number from
appearing on someone else's Caller ID. Telephone companies also offer
an additional service feature that rejects incoming calls that you
block. This rejection feature prevents computer-sex offenders or anyone
else from calling your home anonymously.
4. Devices can be purchased that show
telephone numbers that have been dialed from your home phone.
Additionally, the last number called from your home phone can be
retrieved provided that the telephone is equipped with a redial feature.
You will also need a telephone pager to complete this retrieval.
This is done using a numeric-display
pager and another phone that is on the same line as the first phone with
the redial feature.
Using the two phones and the pager, a
call is placed from the second phone to the pager. When the paging
terminal beeps for you to enter a telephone number, you press the redial
button on the first (or suspect) phone. The last number called from
that phone will then be displayed on the pager.
5. Monitor your child's access to all
types of live electronic communications (i.e., chat rooms, instant
messages, Internet Relay Chat, etc.), and monitor your child's e-mail.
computer-sex offenders almost always meet potential victims via chat
rooms. After meeting a child on-line, they will continue to
communicate electronically often via e-mail.
6. Should any of the following situations
arise in your household, via the Internet or on-line service, you should
immediately contact your local or state law enforcement agency, the FBI,
and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
a. Your child or anyone in the household
has received child pornography;
b. Your child has been sexually solicited by someone who knows that your
child is under 18 years of age.
c. Your child has received sexually explicit images from someone that
knows your child is under the age of 18.
If one of these scenarios occurs,
keep the computer turned off in order to preserve any evidence for
future law enforcement use. Unless directed to do so by the law
enforcement agency, you should not attempt to copy any of the images
and/or text found on the computer.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Office of Crimes Against Children
935 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20535
(202) 324-3666
National Center For Missing & Exploited Children
CYBER TIPLINE
1-800-843-5678
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