On-line Sexual Predators

Shocked. Completely shocked and disturbed. That is how I feel after seeing a special report we aired last night on WHOI. I knew one of our reporters, Ian Schwartz, was working on the story, but I didn't realize what he found. He had been going on-line as a 16-year-old girl. He says he didn't mention anything that would make the men think he was looking for a sexual relationship. He says it was idle chatter.

SIX men from this area actually met up with his decoy! I couldn't believe it. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but when the reporter only put out a few instant messages and got so many replies, it scared me. We really have to be careful about all this on-line chit chat. It would be hard to be raising a teenage girl these days. Often times, teenagers really are meeting other TEENS on-line. So it would be hard to tell a daughter she can't talk to anyone on-line she doesn't know. I can see how kids easily break that rule.

Here's the link to the video of Ian's story.

Let me know what you think. Maybe I'm just out of the loop on this fear because my kids are so young...

-NewsAnchorMom Jen