1 week Ago By Olivia Carville
The “stranger danger” fears of the 20th century can seem quaint compared with the horror stories kids may come across in the digital world. Before the internet, parents feared sexual predators or drug dealers having physical access to their children. Now, they’re just a swipe away.
Kids are growing up online, immersed in social media , obsessed with it and, in some cases, addicted to it. More than 95% of teens in the US use social media, with a third saying they are logged on almost constantly. The fabric of their social lives has shifted from classrooms to smartphone apps, video games and chat forums — internet spaces where it can be impossible to know who you’re really talking to.
And, as Bloomberg’s new documentary Can’t Look Away demonstrates, these online environments can be dangerous and even deadly. The film, which is streaming on Jolt, follows a group of attorneys fighting to hold social media companies accountable for causing devastating harm to kids: cases where teens were ruthlessly blackmailed by international gangs of cyber-sextortionists or sold deadly counterfeit pills by drug dealers who deliver through their bedroom windows. Many parents feel “frazzled” when trying to navigate the best practices for raising children in the digital world , says David Polgar, founder of the responsible tech nonprofit All Tech Is Human.
Every app has its own parental control tools, and the companies encourage parents to master them, he says, but some parents find the tools counter-intuitive and struggle to keep up when their kids are active on dozens of apps. Plus, kids — who are often more digitally savvy than their parents — know how to disable them. “We are going through a digital crisis for our kids.
It’s a real public health crisis,” says Laura Ordoñez of Common Sense Media. “We see malaise and exhaustion from parents,” she says. “Everything is falling onto the parents.
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