Cyberbullying Curriculum From Seattle Public Schools

The Seattle Public Schools has spent the last two years or so developing a middle school curriculum. Mike Donlin, one of the authors of the curriculum, recently contacted us to let us know about the free curriculum that is posted online. Here is what he had to say:

I want to pass along the link to the cyberbullying curriculum which we here in Seattle are rolling out to help ensure online safety for all our students.

http://www.seattleschools.org/area/prevention/cbms.html

The curriculum you find here is complete and useable. However, it is not done. We continue to add more wonderful student writing activities and home-school-classroom communications as we move along. We are also working on a set of extended "culminating activities" for teachers and students.. As they are added, we will seamlessly change out the pages. We are also hoping to get some good feedback as people use the evaluation/feedback forms which are included on the web site with the materials. Even as we say that, we also know that this curriculum will never be really done. Things change too much and too fast for that. The materials were designed to be incorporated into ongoing bullying prevention programs. However, the individual Lessons were created to be flexible enough shorter classroom meeting-type settings or to be used in longer classrooms periods. If they are used in longer classroom settings, they would also fit nicely into existing Technology, Health and Language Arts units. They can also be used as stand-alones within an Exploratory-type setting.

So check these resources out this summer if you are looking to integrate some cyber-safety lessons in your middle school classroom next year!

Three BPS Students Named Winners of Mass State Internet Safety Poster Contest

Three students from two different Boston Public Schools have been named as winners in the Commonwealth's 2009 Kids Safe Online Cyber Security Awareness poster contest. The statewide contest challenged students to create hand drawn posters depicting internet safety strategies such as being careful not to download viruses, not giving out personal information on the internet, not cyberbullying, and not meeting anyone “offline” that you’ve only met online. Ingrid from the John Eliot School and Tim and Daniel from the Joyce Kilmer School had their posters chosen as finalists out of over 200 poster submissions from schools all over the state. Daniel's poster was named one of the top three finalists in the state and therefore will be submitted in a national competition. All thirteen winning entries will be formally recognized in a ceremony as part of National Cyber Security Month in October. You can view all thirteen posters on the Mass.gov website. The three winning entries from Boston are posted below.

The Harmful Effects of Texting and the CyberSafety Campaign is on Facebook

Usually when we teach about internet safety, we don't talk so much about physical injury when using technology, but a recent New York Times article reported that some physicians are worried about repetitive stress injuries in teenagers that send a lot of text messages. Teenagers send and receive an average of 80 text messages per day according to the Nielsen Company. The article also explores how obsessive texting may lead to sleep deprivation, anxiety and distraction in school. There is even a psychologist from MIT who has studied texting among Boston area teenagers for the last three years. She found that texting may even cause a shift in how adolescents are developing. It is definitely a very interesting article, one worth reading. I guess the lesson would be to text in moderation!

I caught the CBS Sunday Morning show this weekend and they aired a story about sexting and the ongoing debate on how severely teens should be punished for sending nude or provocative photos via their cell phone or computer. The video of the story isn't up on the website, but the print story is there. This might be a helpful resource for teachers of older students to use if they want to integrate internet safety with a lesson on debating or persuasive writing. What should the punishment be for underage students who willingly send inappropriate pictures of themselves or others online?


The BPS Cybersafety Campaign is on Facebook!

Eric Esteves of Tech Boston created a page of Facebook for the BPS Cybersafety campaign. Still in its infancy, the page contains links, information, pictures and video of internet safety efforts in Boston. Search for it on Facebook and become a fan! Facebook is still blocked by the BPS network, so don't become a fan while you are on the school's network, become a fan outside of school and join the campaign!

Facebook in the News

A couple of interesting Facebook stories have been published in the news recently having to do with security of information. The first story has to do with cybersecurity and phishing attacks. Facebook has been plagued with these attacks over the past few weeks in which hackers are trying to acquire the login password information of Facebook users. The way that it works is that the hackers will send out a malicious link to the friends of already compromised Facebook accounts. When the user clicks on the link, it takes them to what looks exactly like the Facebook login page. Instead, it is a fake page that will send their username and password information to the criminals. The criminals can then access the user's Facebook account to send out more malicious links or other spam. One other result that can be disastrous for the user whose password information is stolen is if they use that same password for other site accounts as well, such as financial accounts. Criminal hackers know that it can be common practice for people to use the same username and password for multiple online accounts. Facebook has said they are cleaning up the problem, removing the phishing messages and resetting the passwords of compromised accounts. Some strategies to avoid this problem are:

• Do not click on links that you are not sure are legitimate.
  
• Check with the person who sent you the link to make sure they are the ones who sent you the link.
  
• If the click on the link and it immediately takes you to a login page, it may be a phishing scam.
  
• Do not keep the same password for all of your online accounts, especially accounts having to do with finances. I know it can be very difficult to keep track of multiple username and passwords, but keeping them seperate will help you avoid a much larger problem if one of them is ever stolen.
  
• Periodically changing you passwords can also help to minimize damage if your data is ever stolen.

The other story in the news was sent to me by Felicia Vargas and is about college admissions officers scanning Facebook profiles before making final decisions on applicants. In a survey released by the National Association for College Admissions Counseling about 25% of colleges and universities said their admissions officers research prospective students' social-networking profiles before extending admission or scholarships. There was no data on how many of those said that their final decision was influenced because of social networking profiles. It has been known for a while that school admissions and employers may Google an applicants name, search YouTube, Facebook, MySpace or other social networking sites looking for information about that person beyond what they see on in application or in an interview. It is important that students know about their "digital footprint" and what they are leaving behind about themselves online. Check out blog article we posted last November with some of this same information and some links to safe social networking.

H1N1 Virus Attention Attracts Scammers and Phishers

It seems that whenever there is a high impact news story that captivates the world, there are always criminals in the background waiting to prey on people's fears. So, with all the attention being given to the H1N1 Virus (Swine Flu), you also need to be wary of spam email and phishing attacks. There have been numerous reports of scammers sending out emails with titles about the Swine Flu. These emails can contain links or files that infect the user's computer with malware that will either damage the computer or steal personal data that is stored on the computer. Some emails that are being sent out claim to sell vaccines and exotic cures for the Swine Flu. While some scams are easy to spot, others are more difficult for people to pick up on including this example:

Another attack, reported by researchers at Symantec (NSDQ:SYMC), informed recipients of the swine flu disaster by incorporating a linked news headline from reputable news agencies. Users are asked whether they are in the U.S. or Mexico and whether or not they know anybody who is affected by the outbreak. Victims are then requested to share their experiences by filling in Web application forms or replying back with their e-mails and phone numbers. However, the online questionnaire is a way for scammers to steal identifying information from unsuspecting victims.

security experts recommend that users go directly to trusted news sources for information on the swine flu virus and avoid opening unsolicited e-mail messages and links.

You need to be careful about what information you are submitting about yourself online. Cnet.com recently published a very informative article titled, "FAQ: Demistifying ID Fraud" about identity fraud which answers these important questions:

• How does the data get stolen from my computer?
• If I don't use my credit or debit card on the Internet, how does the data get stolen?
• What do the criminals do with the data when they get it?

This is a very informative article and also includes some links of sites to go to if you think you are a victim.

Consequences for Sexting

Three Students in Billerica, who were involved in a recent sexting case, will not face child pornography charges, according to an article in the Boston Herald. Instead of being criminally charged in the incident, the one 13 year old student and two 14 year old students will be required to attend cybersafety classes and will have the use of their cell phones restricted over the next 6 months. The boys who forwarded the photo will also perform 50 hours of community service. The students could have faced much more serious child pornography charges under Massachusetts state law.

More and more states are considering passing laws that specifically deal with sexting. A recent article in eSchool News gives examples of what some states are proposing. Vermont has a bill pending in the House that would create an exemption from prosecution for child pornography for 13- to 18-year-olds on either the sending or receiving end of sexting messages, so long as the sender voluntarily transmits an image of himself or herself. Ohio is another state that is working on legislation that would allow for teens caught sexting not to have to register as sex offenders. It is important for kids to understand, however, that even if these laws are put into place, that there are still consequences to their actions. Some of these states are taking away cell phone and internet use from offenders, as well as making them attend sexual harassment classes.

Most experts agree that teens need to be educated about the risks of sexting. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children have a resource online called Think Before You Post which offers advice on sharing and posting personal information online.

Felicia Vargas and I recently presented to four classes of Middle School students at the McCormick Middle School as a part of their Health and Wellness Day. The main part of the presentation was about cyberbullying, but the organizers of the event asked us to add some information about sexting. So we dedicated the last 15 minutes of the presentation to discussing sexting and its consequences with the students. Most students knew what sexting is, and most admitted that they knew of someone who had sent or received a nude photo of someone on their phone. What a lot of them seemed surprised about were the legal consequences of sexting. We told them that they could get into serious trouble if they participate in this action, including being charged with distribution of child pornography. We also tried to explain that there are also serious emotional consequences to sexting. Unfortunately, a lot of times, the person who takes the photo of themselves doesn't think that it is going to be forwarded on to other people. Children need to understand that once they send a photo out by text, or post it online, that photo can then be passed along to hundreds, thousands, or even millions of other people. We asked students to remember these three important things:

1. Be Smart: Think before you send any pictures out, understand that usually nothing you post is private in cyberspace.
2. Be Strong: Don't give into pressure to do something you are not comfortable with, like sending a nude photo. Don't let your friends give into any pressure.
3. Be Responsible: Don't ask someone to send a nude photo to you and don't forward nude photos to other people if you receive one.
   

Good Morning America Story on Sexting

This Morning, Good Morning America aired a town hall style meeting with teens and parents about Sexting. The piece features Perry Aftab of Wired Safety giving parents a few tips on how to check and see if your child has posted anything inappropriate online. It also features a teenage girl and her mother who share how she sent a nude photograph of herself to her boyfriend, who then forwarded the picture on to other people after they broke up. Here is the link to the video:

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=7337547&page=1

Talk to your students and parents about Sexting. Let them know that Boston School Police and the Boston Police Department could prosecute students for breaking Massachusetts State child pornography laws including Chapter 272 Sections 28, 29, 29A, 29B, 29C. In summary, those laws basically say that you cannot distribute matter that is deemed harmful to minors, disseminate or possess obscene matter, or have anyone under the age of 18 pose for a picture in the state of nudity or engaged in sexual conduct. It is against the law for a picture to be taken and it is against the law for a person to forward that picture if they receive it.

Students that engage in this type of behavior could end up suffering serious consequences including arrest for a felony and registering as a sex offendor. Students who have taken nude photos of themselves and had them forwarded to unintended recipients have suffered severe emotional and psychological damage.