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 Trooper Christopher Ware speaks about child safety on the Internet at the Maple Grove Civic Club meeting. |
Trooper Offers Tips to Keep Online Predators at BayBy Tammy Daniels
iBerkshires Staff
09:07PM / Monday, January 18, 2010
Christopher Ware's been with the state police for 20 years, the last two with the task force. |
ADAMS, Mass. — Below the videos of piano-playing cats, Facebook chatter, political blogs and flashy Web sites lies an ugly underbelly of exploitation.
And it wants your kids.
That was the message state police Trooper Christopher Ware presented on Sunday at the monthly dinner meeting of the Maple Grove Civic Club at the Polish National Alliance. The club brings in speakers each month covering a wide variety of issues.
Ware, a former Williamstown Police officer and longtime state trooper, has been with the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for two years. The federally funded task force is one of 61 in the nation and is based out of Pittsfield.
"I consider myself a pretty worldly guy," said the 51-year-old Ware, who's seen everything from murders to accidents in his more than 20 years on the state police force, but "the first time I had to watch a child pornography video, I was in tears."
The issue has come home forcefully since a local officer was indicted by a grand jury last week on nine counts of downloading and watching child pornography — at the police station. Alan C. Vigiard, a veteran of the Adams Police, resigned shortly after being arraigned last fall.
While few of the members had children at home, hands quickly went up when Ware asked if they had computers — and grandchildren who use them.
"The Internet's great tool if it's used properly but some of the things that are being done on it is horrible," he said, adding "please don't go home ... and yank them off the computer. It's just that we need to be diligent about it."
The simplest way is to keep the computer in a common area and be aware of your children's and grandchildren's cyber friends and favorite Web sites. Ask them to help you set up a Facebook or MySpace account and become their online friend. Ask them about their instant-messaging buddy list — do they know them personally? Are they just online acquaintances? Ask them if someone's made them uncomfortable with bullying or suggestive comments.
Some signs your child may have an inappropriate friend online. Find out more at NetSmartz.com.
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Parents and grandparents may not understand the use of Web chatrooms and friending, but be assured, said Ware, that child molesters do. It's not only computers — youngsters communicate through cell phones, gaming systems, blogging, and with video and digital cameras.
Some of what they're putting out there is personal and may be sexual in nature. It's the kind of material that can attract the worst elements of society, as told by a young woman named Alicia Kozakiewicz in a video shown by Ware.
"The bogey man is real and he lives on the Web. I know, I met him on it," Kozakiewicz tells the House Judiciary Committee, detailing the horrors she suffered at the age of 13 after the teenaged best friend she'd met in a chatroom turned out to be a man with a taste for sadism. "While you are sitting here, he is at home with your children."
An estimated one in seven adolescents — boys as well as girls — online has been propositioned over the Internet; more than a third have been exposed to sexually explicit material.
That's according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. By law, Internet service providers are required to report child pornography to the center, from there the possible locations are tracked and cases sent to the appropriate task force. If the victim or suspect is in Massachusetts, it comes to Ware, who reviews the case and forwards it to one the 70 affiliated investigators across the state.
"Children are being solicited by people that they don't know," said Ware. "[Molesters] know how to be friendly and they know how to get them to meet them."
Ware, speaking here with Pat Baker of Adams, gives presentations at schools and to local groups. |
He urged the adults to talk to the youngsters in their families and impress upon them the dangers not only from strangers but with each other over sharing personal information and sending explicit texts and pictures. Last year, the discovery of racy digital photos of girls at Drury High School lead to warnings that the senders — including the teens taking pictures of themselves — could be charged with child pornography. The Legislature is working on so-called "cyberbullying" bills that include "sexting" to address youngsters' involvement.
Simple texting while driving also has its dangers and has been rumored as the cause of several recent accidents, said Ware. He also cautioned the audience to be careful what they typed into a search; while they were unlikely to run across child pornography (users have an underground code) they could still stumble upon adult sites.
His wife had wanted to order something for him online and guessed the address, he said. "Dick's Sporting goods did not come up." |
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