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Parents, this is what you are up against. This is happening every day, maybe not this extreme but it is happening. You must pay attention to your kids online usage.
For many of you the term monitoring\blocking can sound so negative, i.e. you may think your invading your kids privacy etc. when your kids are posting there information on Myspace, is that private? if your kid being naive clicks on a link that brings them to a inappropriate site, but software you installed blocked that site, is that "invading there privacy"?
Blocking software can block whatever web site you want it to, it also stops virtually all inappropriate material from getting into your home. Monitoring software is a parenting tool to ensure your kid is safe online. Kids are NOT mature enough to handle inappropriate adults confronting them, or worse tricking them into thinking they are a kid too. Mom and dad, You are the first line of defense, you are the one that needs to get control of the Internet usage in your home.
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Adrian Ringland, 36, of Lord Haddon Road, Ilkeston, Derbyshire, posed as an "attractive and innocent" chat room teenager to gain the trust of youngsters either side of the Atlantic, Inner London Crown Court heard.
Once he had the girls' e-mails, the father of two used a highly advanced programme to hack into their PCs, demonstrating the "horrors that lurk within the internet and the minds of some individuals who use it".
By threatening to crash their systems, he then blackmailed his victims into stripping and sending revealing poses of themselves. Ringland backed up his warnings by visibly taking control of their computers, moving cursors around, switching on printers and, in one case, opening and closing the CD-ROM drawer. One of his victims said that his considerable IT expertise reminded her of the cult science fiction film Matrix. Another described her ordeal as "internet rape," while a third threatened suicide.
The court heard that once the defendant felt that he had the vulnerable youngsters under his control he forced them to provide ever more explicit pictures of themselves. He warned that refusal would result in the pictures he already had being sent to their friends, or that valuable files would be wiped from their computers. Ringland was convinced that he was untouchable, boasting to one child: "Call the cops ... they won't trace me." But he reckoned without the courage of one of his victims, a 14-year-old girl in Manitoba, Canada, who ignored her tormentor's threats and told her parents - who then alerted the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
After an extensive investigation, officers eventually cracked his electronic defences and traced him to his home 4,000 miles away. Ringland, who was unemployed and living with his partner at the time, was eventually arrested by local police and bailed. But a random check later caught him having sex with a 14-year-old girl he had groomed on the internet. He pleaded guilty to 20 charges relating to the internet abuse, two of indecency with a child, four of hacking, four of blackmail and ten offences of making indecent photographs of a child. They involved three girls in Britain and one in Canada. Thirteen similar charges concerning a number of 15-year-old girls, again on both sides of the Atlantic, were ordered to remain on file. Ringland also admitted six charges of unlawful intercourse and one of internet grooming.
Lisa Wilding, prosecuting, told the court: "This is a case about manipulation, exploitation and sexual gratification. It is a startling tale that will bring home to you the horrors that lurk within the internet and the minds of some individuals who use it."
An internet paedophile who repeatedly took control of schoolgirls' computers from his own home and "terrorised" them into sending him intimate pictures was jailed today for ten years thanks to the courage of a young Canadian who ignored his threats and told her parents what he was doing.
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