Mossberg’s Mailbox

Monitoring Teens’ Facebook Activity

January 21, 2009 at 5:46 pm PT

What is the best way to monitor our teens’ Facebook activity?

To my mind, this is more a parenting issue than a technology one. The easiest method would be to join Facebook yourself and become one of your teens’ ”friends” on each account they have. That might not sit well with your kids, but if you’re willing to be tough, you could make that a condition of their being on Facebook. You could also insist they use the network’s extensive privacy controls to guard their detailed information and activities from strangers.

There is a paid service called YouDiligence that claims it will notify you if certain words appear on a child’s Facebook page. But it requires that you be one of your child’s Facebook friends, so it is mainly a time-saver. Also, because it focuses on words, it doesn’t flag photos or other Facebook activity.

Another paid service, called imView, automatically takes pictures of the screen of the PC your child uses, at intervals you select, and allows you to view these screen shots at your leisure, from any Internet-connected PC. Its maker touts this as a way to monitor Facebook activity. I haven’t tested either of these two services.

I want to transfer my Mini DV taped videos from my video camera to my Mac. But my new MacBook has no Firewire port, which is the only port my camera includes — only USB ports. Am I stuck?

Maybe not. One option would be to see if you can borrow a Mac or Windows PC that does have a Firewire port, convert the videos to digital files on that borrowed machine, and then transfer the resulting files to your new Mac using an external hard disk or flash drive. Obviously, you wouldn’t want to have to do this often.

Another option: A company called Pixela (pixela-1.com) claims to have a Firewire-to-USB cable meant for exactly your situation. It is for Windows only, but might well work if you installed and ran Windows on your Mac. However, a glance at the company’s Web site shows it is out of the version of the cable that works with the North American, as opposed to European, video standard. If you are in North America, you might check with the company to see if and when the correct version will be available. One important caution: I haven’t tested it, so don’t know how well it works.

My computer crashed last fall, and I lost thousands of iTunes songs. I would like to copy all the songs to my new computer from my iPod, which still contains them. However, iTunes allows only purchased songs to be returned. Is there software that would help me?

Yes. There are several utility programs designed to copy the contents of an iPod back to a Windows or Mac computer. The one I usually recommend, because I have found it works well, is called Music Rescue. It costs 10 British pounds, or about $15 at current exchange rates. It can be purchased at kennettnet.co.uk.

You can find Mossberg’s Mailbox, and my other columns, online free of charge at the new All Things Digital Web site, http://walt.allthingsd.com.

Tagged with cable, camera, computer, digital, European, external hard disk, Facebook, FireWire, flash drive, friend, imView, Internet, iPod, iTunes, Mac, Mini DV, Music Rescue, North American, parenting, PC, Pixela, port, privacy controls, songs, teen, USB, utility program, video, video standard, Web site, Windows PC, YouDiligence

comments so far. Add yours.

Miguel Gonzalez

To the person who lost the iTunes songs: if you are running a Mac, I suggest that you give Senuti a try. I used it and it does an excellent job. You can download a 30 day trial at http://www.fadingred.com/senuti/
http://www.youdiligence.com Michael Howe

I am with YouDiligence, and I wanted to make a few clarifications about our platform and about internet safety in general.

First, when a parent creates an account, the account comes with an extensive searchable word list that we match against a child’s Facebook or MySpace page, but parents are also able to add whatever keywords they might be concerned about. We also search image captions, video captions, comments on a child’s pages AND the comments a child leaves on their friends’ pages. And we are exploring image and video technology, so we will incorporate sooner than later, the ability to identify troubling images (for example a bong or inappropriate nudity) and send an alert upon this identification.

Secondly, the platform can actually work in one of two ways–either a parent with a Facebook or MySpace page needs to be befriended by their teen or tween OR the parent could have the child’s login and password itself and they can use that info to search the respective pages.

On the privacy issue, I would argue that children that are acting responsibly might have more privacy with YouDiligence than without. Our service was explicitly designed to be minimally invasive of a child’s privacy. We designed it so that parents don’t need to physically visit their child’s pages to determine whether they are concerned about their child’s activity.

Finally, I’d like to address the privacy and the significant amount of time saving that we truly provide, inside of a single point.

MySpace and Facebook both have sprawling chaotic architecture, and looking for content there is sometimes like looking for a needle in a haystack. We can provide a buffer to all this content, much of which is benign, so an engaged and concerned parent doing their job, is not plowing through all this material. Instead, they only need to review the notifications from their email and dashboard. In this case, the child has more privacy with YouDiligence than without, and they really are saving themselves many hours a week.

We have been working with University athletic departments for over a year.
Joe Keenan

This is a parenting issue, not a technology issue. Parents need to discuss Facebook with their kids and come to an agreement with regard to its use by the child, and its monitoring by the parent. This has to be a trusting relationship, not one of snooping or spying. My 17 year-old and I agreed that I can sit down occasionaly and review her Facebook profile. And, we use it as a way to talk about her life, her friends, her issues. Have I been opposed to some of the content — including her posts? Yes, and I’ve asked her to remove some things.

Skip the spyware and use this as an opportunity to connect with your kid.
bob baty-barr

Walt, I follow your column fairly regularly and am glad I saw it today. I actually use YouDiligence for my two sons who have Facebook accounts, and I can report that it works very well. It is easy to set up, and it does grab the captions and comments on the photos so there is decent coverage there.

I do have open dialog with my boys, but honestly, it isn’t my boys comments and actions I am monitoring, it is the friends postings that are of most concern.

I like YouDiligence because I know if something I don’t approve of gets posted, I will get an email and I can address it immediately. It has lessened my worry about my kids using Facebook, and saved me a lot of time and energy to not have to snoop through their pages. Love the column.
Julie Tait

I am a mother of four teens, two boys and two girls, age 18, 17, 15, and 13. Facebook is a daily part of our lives, so I want to share my thoughts. So many people I know have the same viewpoint that Walt does about simply creating a separate account and making the child “friend” you. The problem with this option is that the child can then go into their preferences and specifically block certain content from being viewable by you. And you won’t even know what you’re missing. The only way to really fully monitor your child on Facebook is to have the child’s username and password, and log in AS THEM. It is the only way to see the full monty, period. And for those who think that this is too invasive, I say, are you kidding me? Do you realize that the prefix for the Facebook web address is WWW- WORLD WIDE WEB. By definition, there is no privacy there. Get a grip and take control. You are the parent. You have the right to demand this information from your child, even when they kick and scream. My kids don’t love that I monitor so closely, but even my 18 year old has expressed that he now understands why, and he appreciates the limits set by us as parents.
Kevin Timmons

I use a “spy” program called Spector Pro. I tell my kids that it is on all of our computers and that I can see everything they do online if I want. However, I also tell them, truthfully, that I won’t be watching over their shoulders and that I will only look when their actions warrant it. For instance, if I find them on the Internet at 3 AM, they know I will be reviewing what they have been doing for the last week or so. If the program alerts me to a visit to a banned web site or type of content, they know I will be examining what they have been doing. If their grade in chemistry goes from 95 to 80, I’m going to be taking a look.

I don’t believe that our kids have an ironclad “right” to unfettered Internet access, but if they are responsible about it, they won’t have a problem with me. I do feel that as a parent i have an obligation to guide and protect them, just like learning to drive. I feel that the way I am doing it accomplishes that.