Advice For Online Safety

24 year old man jailed for sex attack after meeting young girl on Facebook.

24 year old Scott Spencer used Facebook to befriend the 11-year-old girl and arranged to meet up with her in Long Eaton in April this year.

He went to several shops with her then took her to an area off the canal bank where he kissed, touched and sexually assaulted her

Spencer, of Ilkeston Road in Nottingham was charged with sexual assault of female child under 13 and two counts of inciting a female under 13 to engage in sexual activity - and admitted the charges. Earlier this month he was jailed for four years.

He was also ordered to remain on the Sex Offender?s Register for life, given a Sexual Offences Prevention Order (SOPO) for a period of 20 years and disqualified from working with children.

He denied a charge of witness intimidation and it was ordered to lie on file.

Police want people to follow this advice to stay safe:

Install a websafe browser on computers? Ask your child to show you the sites they use and help them to create strong passwords for any they log into

Talk to your child?s mobile phone operator about filtering software to block inappropriate content and websites? 

If your child uses social networking sites to communicate with friends, ensure they set their  profile setting to private and together add the ClickCEOP app to their profile on Facebook,  www.facebook.com/clickceop  

Help your children to understand they should never give out personal details to online friends they do not know offline. These include an email address, mobile number, school name, sports club, arrangements for meeting up with friends and any pictures or videos of themselves, their family or friends. 

Make your children aware that they need to think carefully about the information, videos and pictures they put online or exchange with friends. 

If your child receives spam or junk email and texts, remind them never to believe their contents, reply to them or use them

It's not a good idea for your child to open files that are from people they don't know. They won't know what they contain - it could be a virus, or worse - an inappropriate image or film

Help your child to understand that some people lie online and that therefore, it's better to keep online mates online. They should never meet up with any strangers without an adult they trust

Always make sure your child feels comfortable in being able to come to you or someone they trust if they are worried about anything online. Teach young people how to block someone online and report them if they feel uncomfortable. 

For more advice on how children can stay safe in the Internet visit http://www.derbyshire.police.uk/Safety-advice/Personal-Safety/Internet-Safety.aspx