Friday, December 22, 2006

Christmas is Coming

It's getting near to that time of year again, no doubt you will know of family members or friends who will be treating themselves or their children to a nice new bit of kit or an online connection.

As the person in their lives who knows a bit about computers, no doubt you will be asked to help set it up and you will be asked for a little expert advice, which will go in one ear and out of the other because they just can't wait to get started!! rolleyes.gif

May I suggest that you leave them with a few sites to visit... perhaps even make a HTML file with some handy links and leave it on their desktop. Here are a few suggestions for you.

Get Safe Online: A site sponsored by the UK Government and leading businesses to help you protect yourself against internet threats. And excellent site and well worth spending some time browsing around it. My only gripe is that they don't really have a comprehensive list of freely available software but I have a few listed on my Favourites page.

Bank Safe online; Provides advice on steps to take to bank safely online, plus a whole lot more. Make sure you check out the Helpful Sites page.

Stay Safe Online - A US site similar to Get Safe Online, well worth a visit.

Think U Know - Teenagers know it all.. and this is an excellent site aimed at them to make sure that they do know it all when it comes to staying safe and having fun on the internet.

Chatdanger - It's an exciting world out there and our kids are going to chat whether we like it or not. This site has been produced by the charity Childnet International. Another great site for teaching kids about online safety.

Microsoft Security at Home - This is Microsoft's security site and is another great place to start to get information about how to keep yourself, your computer and your children safe and secure online, it will also keep you up to date with all the Windows XP related news.

Finally... our kids love to talk and they love Messenger and they will love Messenger Plus Live, because all their friends have it. Please make sure you check that they install this program without the sponsor program, Lop infections seem to make a dramatic increase over the Christmas period for some reason or other!!!! Sandi Hardmeier has a nice write up on the latest version of MessengerPlus on her blog

Merry Christmas to you all and please have a safe and secure 2007

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