The web site Mashable.com reports that MySpace is working on a new tracker that will enable parents to monitor what their teens are doing on MySpace. The article, titled "MySpace Tracker Tracks Teens", describes the upcoming software, named Zephyr, as follows:
Zephyr allows parents to track the name, age and location their children have entered on MySpace, although it doesn’t let them view their child’s e-mail or view his or her profile page. Once the software is downloaded, it grabs this information for any user that logs on from that machine and saves it as a password protected file on the hard disk. It then notifies parents whenever the name, age or location on that profile is changed, even if it’s changed from another computer. It continues to work if the profile is private.
I'll continue to watch for news about Zephyr and I'll give it a test run when it becomes available.
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The recent Pew Internet report, titled "Social Networking and Teens: An Overview" suggests that the effort to educate teens about online safety is succeeding. A key finding of the study was that 66% of teens who have a profile on a social networking site have set their profile to private. In addition, only 13% of older (15-17 years old) girls use their social networking site for flirting (29% of older boys flirt online).
This is great news for the teens themselves, and should set parents' minds more at ease as well. The nature of the Internet, and the risks entailed through publishing a completely public online presence, are now well understood by most teens.