Politicians are pressuring the big tech companies to do more to make the Internet safer for children, and they should. The Senate Judiciary Committee pushed Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg to do more to protect children from the dark web, but that can’t be the end of the conversation. How safe can the Internet be for children? Access to hard-core pornography today is a lot different than the Boomer generation finding their Dad’s Playboy magazines!
It may be unrealistic to think the Internet can be made 100% safe for children because kids will find ways to bypass even the strictest and well-intended protections. The big tech companies should be pressured into doing all they can - even if costs are a factor - to make the Internet safer for kids, but society can’t be naive to the reality that kids will find ways to circumvent the safeguards - they always will - and tech companies can’t do anything about that.
Pressuring the big tech companies to do more may be a subtle request for them to become parents. But parents need to do their job and teach their children how to handle some of the dark reaches of the Internet and how to interpret the communications with evil-doers who will attempt to lure underaged children into sexual situations.
No matter what the big tech companies do - parents still need to parent their children and prepare them for exposure to the things they do not want them exposed too. Internet safeguards should never be seen as a replacement for parenting.
