Understand: Social Media is a Public Space

Most of the communication taking place on Social Media is viewable to everyone. Since the information posted is public, it can usually be reposted on the site by anyone who sees it.

While Social Media can be protected so only approved followers can see content, most users share their posts with everyone, or a wide group of friends.

Advise: Protect passwords

Explain to your child that passwords should never be shared, not even with their friends. It's important to log out of any websites they logged into on a shared computer, otherwise, other people may be able to access their information.

Use Online Safety to Connect with your Child

Teens in particular may feel like parents are disconnected from their perspective and fear conversations about online safety will be awkward or embarrassing. Listen to how your child is using social media and other online mediums. Take their online relationships seriously, ask questions and perhaps even brainstorm together to come up with solutions to safety issues they or you have encountered.

Keep a Healthy Life Balance

As a parent, you're a role model for your child. Demonstrate the importance of a balance between online and other activities by encouraging family activities offline as well as online.

Encourage Critical Thinking

Take the opportunity to not only learn about the sorts of situations your child is experiencing online but also use these to identify solutions and encourage critical thinking. Ask them questions like:

• Who do we as a family share our information with?
• How do we trust the people online and establish our groups of friends?
• How can our posts be interpreted and so what do we need to think about when we post online?

Think before Posting

As parents, you may have seen children say or write things that were not meant to be hurtful but that others found offensive or upsetting. Help your child evaluate whether or not something is okay to post by reminding them that if they wouldn't say it to the person's face or out loud, they shouldn't say it online either.

The nature of the Internet makes it difficult to completely erase content. Consider having a conversation about how what gets posted online can hurt feelings, affect offline relationships and even jeopardize future opportunities.

Block, Ignore and Speak to a Trusted Adult About It

If your child receives unwanted tweets from another user, we generally recommend that he or she block that user and end communication rather than engage. Ignoring the content shows unwillingness to engage in such interaction, and in most cases, the aggressor loses interest. Simply don't engage and tell a trusted adult about what is happening.

Some of the following content was borrowed from Google

Secure Your Passwords

Passwords are the first line of defense against cyber criminals. It’s crucial to pick strong passwords that are different for each of your important accounts and it is good practice to update your passwords regularly. Follow these tips to create strong passwords and keep them secure.

Use a Unique Password for Each Important Account

Like you would for Email and Online Banking

Choosing the same password for each of your online accounts is like using the same key to lock your home, car and office – if a criminal gains access to one, all of them are compromised. So don’t use the same password for an online newsletter as you do for your email or bank account. It may be less convenient, but picking multiple passwords keeps you safer.

Use a Long Password Made up of Numbers, Letters and Symbols

The longer your password is, the harder it is to guess. So make your password long to help keep your information safe.

• Adding numbers, symbols and mixed-case letters makes it harder for would-be snoops or others to guess or crack your password. Please don’t use ‘123456’ or ‘password,’ and avoid using publicly available information like your phone number in your passwords. It’s not very original, and it isn’t very safe!
• Set up your password recovery options and keep them up-to-date
• If you forget your password or get locked out, you need a way to get back into your account. Many services will send an email to you at a recovery email address if you need to reset your password, so make sure your recovery email address is up-to-date and an account you can still access.
• Sometimes you can also add a phone number to your profile to receive a code to reset your password via text message. Having a mobile phone number on your account is one of the easiest and most reliable ways to help keep your account safe. For example, service providers can use the phone number to challenge those who try to break into your account, and can send you a verification code so you can get into your account if you ever lose access. Giving a recovery phone number to Google won’t result in you being signed up for marketing lists or getting more calls from telemarketers.
• Your mobile phone is a more secure identification method than your recovery email address or a security question because, unlike the other two, you have physical possession of your mobile phone.
• If you can’t or don’t want to add a phone number to your account, many websites may ask you to choose a question to verify your identity in case you forget your password. If the service you’re using allows you to create your own question, try to come up with a question that has an answer only you would know and isn’t something that you’ve posted about publicly or shared on social media.
• Try to find a way to make your answer unique but memorable – you can do this by using the tip above – so that even if someone guesses the answer, they won’t know how to enter it properly. This answer is very important for you to remember – if you forget it you may never be able to get back into your account.

Consider using a Password Manager

Consider using a password manager to help you keep track of all your various accounts. LastPass.com is often recommended as a free option. Another great password manager (but isn't free) is 1Password (for Mac/IOS).

Lock your screen or device

You wouldn’t go out for the day and leave your front door wide open, right? The same principle applies to the devices you use. You should always lock your screen when you finish using your computer, laptop or phone. For added security, you should also set your device to automatically lock when it goes to sleep. This is especially important for phones or tablets, which are more likely to get misplaced and discovered by people you don’t want to access your information, and home computers that are in shared spaces.