BLAIR COUNTY, Pa (WJAC) — As families get ready for the first day of school, child safety advocates and prosecutors are urging parents to think twice about how much personal information they share online in popular back-to-school social media posts.
Officials say photos that may seem harmless, including common first-day pictures with chalkboards listing details about a child, can be used by child predators.
“We found the huge trend this time of year is the cute little chalkboards that parents post on the first day of school and how much information we are people are sharing of their children when they do that,” said Richard Servello, program director of the Blair County Center for Child Justice.
Cambria County District Attorney Jessica Aurandt said online predators are more common than many people realize.
“Unfortunately there are significantly more child predators online than any of us realize. It is a prevalent problem that we see come through our office on a regular basis, and we know that that’s just a small portion of the predators who are actually out there,” Aurandt said.
Aurandt warned that details such as a child’s school district, teacher, interests or other identifying information can be red flags because predators can use those specifics to build trust.
“If families are sharing information about their children on social media, like what their favorite sport is, what their favorite food is, different identifying information about the child, a predator can take that information and use it to earn trust of that child, and we call that grooming. And so the information that seems very innocent to share when documenting a memory for a child actually can be manipulated,” Aurandt said.
She also urged parents to look closely at what appears in the background of a photo, including anything that could reveal where a child lives.
“A lot of people will take a picture in front of their front door that may have a house number visible, or some sort of landmark that makes it easy for a child predator to locate where that child lives,” Aurandt said.
Servello said the goal is not to discourage families from celebrating the moment, but to limit what is shared publicly.
“Nothing we say is telling them not to do it, you know celebrate the day celebrate the moment. But just limit what you’re putting out there. We don’t want a ton of information out for people to use inappropriately, you know, so maybe just a first name or a nickname. Maybe what grades are going into and really that’s about it,” Servello said.
Officials said it is perfectly fine to fill out a chalkboard for yourself and other trusted people as long as that information does not make it onto the internet.
