It was time for drastic measures.

*At the request of the family, we have changed their names to protect their privacy.

If the situation seems cliché, like something you've read in myriad magazines warning about the dangers of kids and the Internet, you need to know this:

One in seven kids report having received unwanted sexual solicitation online, according to a 2006 study released by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Further, one-third say they have been exposed to unwanted sexual material.

Bear in mind, this is unwanted sexual solicitation or material. The study didn't track wanted (or tolerated, or joking) sexual contact from friends—or strangers—that many kids consider harmless fun. Experts believe the percentage of kids exposed to this kind of sexual contact is much higher.

This article isn't about how to protect your kids from sexual predators—or friends with a passion for peek-a-boo email. It's about making sure you know what your kids are doing online, on the phone, and with any other piece of technology they know how to manipulate better than you.

It's about cluing you in.

The basic problems associated with the Internet, IM (instant messaging), cell phones and other technologies are far from new, as parental vexation goes. Replace the form of media and you have a dilemma common to most parents around the world, regardless of whether their kids have access to technology: how do you handle your kids when they're doing things you don't understand or know little about?

The first step is to become educated—in this case, not only about the technology itself, but about how kids are using it and what effect it has on them.

Let's start with the Internet: 93% of all American children between the ages of 12 and 17 use the Internet, says Amanda Lenhart, Senior Research Specialist at Pew Internet and American Life Project. Not only that, its usage among children has skyrocketed in the past decade: approximately six million kids used the Internet in 1994, while more than 22 million were online in 2004, the last year for which firm statistics are available.

What is it about the Internet that's so appealing to teenagers? Essentially, the same thing that makes it appealing to us adults: it offers a virtual world in which to experiment with one's identity; a place to try different personas, genders, or ethnicities; a forum to connect with others who are wildly different—or quite similar—all while remaining in the safety of one's own surroundings.

"Kids are able to network on a global scale with people who have the same interests as them," says Joel Adkins, the campus technology coordinator at West Lake High School in Austin and winner of the 2007 award for best instructional technology specialist in Texas. "These types of social networks allow kids to find others with the same passions they have and to share their ideas in a non-judgmental way in a safe environment. Can we as teachers say the same thing about our classrooms?"

For teens, social networking is the primary reason to use the Internet. MySpace.com is an excellent case is point: the web site boasts more than 162 million accounts, most of which are owned by youth ages 14 to 24.

According to Danah Boyd, a doctoral candidate at U.C. Berkeley's School of Information Science who delivered a talk about MySpace at the 2006 American Association for the Advancement of Science conference, MySpace not only is a place to hang out, it is the "cultural glue itself" for teens.

"Many teens access MySpace at least once a day or whenever computer access is possible. Teens that have a computer at home keep MySpace opened while they are doing homework or talking on instant messenger. In schools where it is not banned or blocked, teens check MySpace during passing period, lunch, study hall and before/after school," said Ms. Boyd in her talk, which is published online at www.danah.org/papers/AAAS2006.html. "For most teens, [MySpace.com] is simply a part of everyday life—they are there because their friends are there and they are there to hang out with those friends.... MySpace and IM have become critical tools for teens to maintain Ôfull-time always-on intimate communities' where they keep their friends close even when they're physically separated."

Of course, MySpace isn't the only online social networking site—Wikipedia lists more than 90 others—but MySpace certainly is the most popular, receiving more hits per day than Google (in 2005, the last year for which accurate statistics could be found, MySpace received 10,593 hits per second).

According to Ms. Lenhart at the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 55% of all teenagers who go online use social networking websites, particularly girls between the ages of 15 and 17.

Many parents understandably worry that the contacts kids make on these sites can be dangerous. That is, of course, possible. But Ms. Lenhart is careful to point out that social networking sites usually offer positive—and, in some cases, life saving—experiences for teens. To illustrate, she points out an incident involving a researcher in California who received a message from a teenager whom she didn't know very well but whose profile was connected to her. The message read, "I am suicidal". Concerned, the researcher emailed the teen, asking, "Are you OK? What's going on? Can I help?" The teenager posted back, "I have taken an overdose of pills". The researcher used her network and the information the teen provided in his profile to figure out which school he attended. She then called the principal of the school, who in turn contacted the teen's parents, who sent an ambulance to the teen at home, thus saving his life.

Although that's an extreme case, it's not extreme to say that the Internet

has been a lifeline for teenagers in terms of finding support when they can't (or think they can't) get it at home. For example, teens can receive relatively reliable health information about topics like birth control and STDs with a few clicks of the mouse.

They also can navigate their way through the minefield that is the teenage social scene. In one report on teen Internet usage, Lalita Suzuki and Jerel Calzo, of UCLA's Children's Digital Media Center, looked at the questions and comments teenagers posted on online bulletin boards. In general, teens asked questions about romantic concerns, sexual health and body image—things like, "How do I ask a girl out or at least talk to her?" or "Hooked penis. Help me." Most of the replies were emotionally supportive and helpful, such as "I'm sure you'll find that special person and she won't know just how lucky she is. God bless".

This doesn't mean that virtual reality is a harmless playground and that parents ought not be concerned. On the contrary, as teen use of the Internet has increased, so too have the problems associated with it.

As parents, we hear a lot about online sexual solicitation—meaning, adults posing as kids to lure teens and pre-teens into frightening situations. While that certainly happens—as mentioned before, one in seven teens has received unwanted sexual advances online—it is not so common as cyber bullying.

In fact, a 2005 study of 1,500 teens, conducted by cyber bullying experts Dr. Sameer Hinduja and Dr. Justin Patchin (www.cyberbullying.us), found that one third of kids had been the victims of cyber bullying, and that 16% had done some bullying themselves (55% of whom said they did it for fun).

"Teens are bullying more and more and it's called flaming—they Ôburn you' and may flood your email address with unwanted emails by simply signing your email address up for daily newsletters," says retired detective Ric Bentz, a computer crimes expert and former CBI Cyber Crimes task force member. "[I]f they are more sophisticated, they may send a Denial of Service Bots to your computer and flood it with what is called pings that will eventually overload your system, shutting it down."

Technology has democratized bullying, says Anastasia Goodstein, creator of Ypulse.com and author of the book Totally Wired: What Teens and Tweens Are Really Doing Online. This means that just about anybody can bully now, she says, because the Internet offers not only anonymity but also distance.

Online bullying also is more aggressive, mean, and fast than the in-person kind, says Ms. Lenhart. "Whereas before, the whispers would take time to spread, now [they] can spread at lightening speed with 300 of your closest friends," she says.

Parents should be concerned about cyber bullying not only because it is so prevalent, but also because it can escalate beyond cyberspace and into real life, especially at school. In fact, 12% of the respondents in the above cyber bullying study said they had been threatened with physical violence; 5% were afraid for their safety. However, fewer than 15% had told an adult about the cyber bullying.

Federal law recognizes cyber bullying—defined as anonymous abuse, threats or harassment via the internet or other telecommunication system—as a crime punishable by a fine and up to two years in prison.

Figuring out the identity of an anonymous cyber bully isn't easy, but it can be done. Both emails and instant messages leave behind "fingerprints" in the form of nine-digit numbers recorded with your Internet Service Provider (ISP). Computer networking tools, such as traceroute or nslookup, can be used to find these numbers. Although this will allow you to figure out the ISP of the offender, you probably won't be able to trace the message back to the actual computer that sent it; for this you'll need help from law enforcement.

When it comes to really staying connected, though, nothing compares with cell phones. Any parent of a teenager will tell you that, if given the opportunity, teens will spend most of their waking moments on the phone. Cell phones have simply made this easier to do—anywhere.

According to the Teen and Technology report by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 45% of teenagers have cell phones; NOP World Technology, a New York Research firm, released a report in 2005 that almost doubles that figure, finding 75% of teens ages 15-to-17 carry cell phones.

The two studies also offer differences on what kids want to do with those phones. The Pew report says 33% of teens use their phones for text messaging, while the NOP report says 71% want their phones to play music and 70% want them to have a camera.

Although cell phones offer parents peace of mind—by allowing them to call their child any time during the day—they also offer a distraction that can range from annoying to downright dangerous.

The distraction is so great that most school districts in Central Texas prohibit cell phone use during the school day.

"Cell phones are a disruption to the education day," says Joylynn Occhiuzzi, Director and Community Relations Coordinator for the Round Rock ISD. "There is a time and place to use such technology [but] during the school day students should be focused on learning and not on answering cell phones".

Getting kids off the phone is a good idea, given that one study pegged teens as using their cell phone 70-to-90 times per day! (Interestingly, that same study didn't consider 70-times per day "heavy usage".)

The thing to consider here isn't the fact that your kids are using a cell phone, but how much they're using it and where.

One study you may have read about suggested that the longer kids spend on a cell phone, the more prone they are to depression—that study has since been widely discredited. But there are plenty of other, reputable studies out there that demonstrate cell phone use can be bad for everything from grades to driving.

For example, a 1999 study of more than 3,000 Japanese high school students and their parents found that 68% of kids who owned a cell phone received poor grades in school. Ford Motor Company conducted a driving study that found the teen "miss rate"—the rate at which teens failed to respond to potentially dangerous events—was 50% when they were using a cell phone and only 3% when they weren't using one. (Adults using cell phones had only a 13% miss rate.)

Texas and 11 other states have banned teen cell phone use while driving; many other states are considering such legislation.

If your child's cell phone is fully functioning (as opposed to specially designed children's cell phones that allow only a few outgoing numbers), chances are he or she is using it in the same way as the Internet. That means all of the same benefits—and downsides—apply.

Parents often don't realize the crucial role they play in how their kids use media—a role that has little to do with technology and everything to do with basic parenting.

You simply have to build a positive relationship with your child, says Dr. Elizabeth Vandewater, director of UT Austin's Center for Research on Interactive Technology, Television and Children. "[If] they can't talk to you when they are younger, they are less likely to do that when they are older," she says.

The discussion about media use should begin when kids are little and navigating things like video games and television. (Remember, television is still the most popular form of media use among children: on average, kids watch 28 hours of television per week.)

"When your children are young, get in the habit controlling [their] media use," says Dr. Vandewater. This will set the tone for later media use and the authority you'll want to have over it.

As kids get older, your role as media gatekeeper increases. Think of it this way: we hold automobile companies responsible for defects in their cars, but if we use the vehicle recklessly, we have nobody to blame but ourselves. The same goes for the Internet and sites like MySpace, says Lt. C.L. Williams who heads the Dallas Police Department's Crimes Against Children unit.

"MySpace can try to police itself and set up internal controls [but] if parents are not watching what their children are doing on the net, then MySpace becomes a dangerous place," he says. "It is our job as parents to keep our children safe on the net."

Parents have a responsibility to find out what their kids are doing with technology, but gleaning this knowledge can be difficult. The best way to open a dialogue is to ask your kids' opinions about their media use and listen without passing judgment. It's also important to learn which services and web sites your kids use and what their privacy settings are. Are their MySpace profiles set to private? Do they ever receive bullying emails or text messages? What do they do when this happens? And how do they respond to unwanted emails or requests?

Parents also must become technology literate. There's no way you can navigate your kids' complicated online lives if your knowledge of media is limited to television and radio. Besides, having tech knowledge will increase your credibility with your kids while helping you to understand their fascination with various types of technology, says Frances Jacobson Harris, librarian, University Laboratory High school and Professor of Library Administration at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Your first step should be to sign up for an instant messaging service; next, you should create a MySpace account. Setting up a group blog or wiki (an online site that allows users to post or edit content) for your extended family is also a good idea; you can use it to post pictures and share holiday letters. Most important: use technology to communicate as your kids do.

Secondly, put the computer your children use in a community location in the house—not in their room. Then, sit down with your children and develop an Internet contract. This contract should spell out where your kids can and cannot go online, as well as the consequences if they break the rules. (You can find a sample contract at www.protectkids.com/parentsafety/pledge.htm).

Finally, use Internet filtering software—but don't rely on it exclusively. The best software isn't nearly as good as a parent who is in the room and showing an interest in what their child is doing online.

That's exactly what Dianne decided to do with her daughter, Chloe. At first, Dianne allowed Chloe to surf the Internet only when Dianne was in the room. After a while, Dianne set reasonable limits on Chloe's use; when Chloe demonstrated that she would adhere to those limits, Dianne began to allow her to use the computer independently. As a result, Chloe has become more honest with Dianne, even sharing Internet slang with her. Dianne says their relationship has improved markedly.

So, too, has Chloe's responsible exploration of the Internet. She not only uses it to pursue her passion in music, but she also has a blog where she posts music she has written.

"I have met so many amazing people through MySpace and my blog," Chloe says. "I've found friends on the net who, like me, are into heavy metal and punk. At first, they used to give their two cents on my lyrics. Now, we are even thinking of forming a band together. Yes, a virtual band. Cool, eh?"

Sugandha Jain is an internationally published journalist. She has a Masters in Developmental Psychology from the University of Texas at Dallas. She and her husband live in Austin and are expecting their first baby in May.