Parents monitoring kids: Study

Nearly half of US parents keep tabs on their kids' online activities daily or weekly, according to a survey just released by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and Cox Communications. The other half (51%) "say they don't have monitoring software on household computers that teenagers use or don't know whether their computers have such software," CNET reports, and 42% don't review what their teenagers are "saying" in chat rooms or instant-messaging (58% say they do). In other findings...

* 28% of parents "don't know or are not sure if their teens talk to strangers online."
* 30% allow their teenagers to use the computer in private areas of the house, e.g. a bedroom or home office.
* As for the lingo/acronyms kids use in IM, 57% of parents don't know "LOL" (laughing out loud), 68% don't know "BRB" (be right back), 92% don't know "A/S/L" (age/sex/location, which kids shouldn't give out online), and 95% don't know "POS" (parent over shoulder) or "P911" (parent alert).

For monitoring help, here's a thorough survey by the Providence Journal of monitoring and other online-safety tools and services available to parents. For more, type versions of the words "filtering," "monitor," etc. into a NetFamilyNews.org search box (at the top of each page), or go to GetNetWise.org's tools page.