Kyra Schraiber's mom didn't let her or any of her five siblings have a computer because she had heard so many stories about online sexual predators.
She thought a cell phone was harmless.
Wendy Schraiber gave Kyra a cell phone when she was 12, believing the device would help her daughter stay in contact with her during the dark days following her husband's suicide.
A sexual predator found her daughter anyway.
Increasingly online predators are using phones, BlackBerrys and other handheld devices to seek out and groom potential underage victims, police say.
Kyra, now 13, used her phone to look for some music and ended up on a networking site. A 20-year-old man texted her and said he was getting off work soon. She texted him back and agreed to meet him because, as she says, "I have trouble saying 'no.'"
The man came to pick her up, then sexually assaulted her.
Maximino Sanchez-Castro, an illegal immigrant who pleaded guilty to assaulting Schraiber, was sentenced to three years in prison and faces deportation when his sentence is up.
Kyra decided to go public with her story with her mother's permission to warn other teens about the dangers lurking at the touch of a tiny keypad. She appeared on the Dr. Phil show just last week.
"I try to tell them to stay off MySpace and Facebook," the eighth-grader said. "I feel like I'm a better person because I can help other teens."
Kyra's case isn't uncommon. Hundreds of phone predators are stalking victims, police say.
In a move to catch the predators, Jefferson County, Colo., has a new crime-fighting tool. The Child Sex Offender Internet Investigations Unit, which is run out of the district attorney's office, has started using software called RADAR. It's the law enforcement version of commercial software for parents called My Mobile Watchdog that works on certain "smart phones."
RADAR allows law enforcement officers to track, organize and store all incoming and outgoing text messages so they can more easily build criminal cases, according to Mike Harris, who supervises the investigative unit.
Harris pretends to be a young girl as he awaits predator contact in chat rooms or other online spaces. He was the first officer to make an arrest using the software, available at no cost to investigators. He has used it in more than half of his arrests since March.
Harris said he has made 318 arrests, including 83 last year. So far this year, he has made 18. Last year he had to take a break because the work overwhelmed him.
Harris said parents shouldn't worry only about their child meeting a predator in person.
He cited a straight-A student in California who was courted for six months by a male she thought was her own age. Finally, she agreed to send him nude pictures of herself. She was shocked when the FBI came to her door to tell her she had actually befriended a 57-year-old teacher who had a collection of explicit photos. The young woman considered suicide, Harris said.
Harris said many predators start out looking for young people online.
"But they're very cunning," Harris said. "They want to switch to a phone to get more explicit about their intentions and to arrange meetings."
Here are some online safety tips for parents:
- Keep the computer in a visible area, not the child's bedroom.
- Don't rely on filtering software to supervise your children's computer usage.
- Get to know your children's online friends just as you would their other friends.
Here are some online safety tips for kids:
- Use a gender-neutral screen name.
- Never give out personal information -- first or last names, phone numbers, passwords, birth dates or years or credit-card information.
- Never meet anyone you don't already know.
- Don't tell anyone your schedule or where you'll be.
- Don't fill out any "fun" questionnaires that are forwarded to you, even if they're from your friends.
- Don't answer e-mails or instant messages from people you don't know.
- Be careful about posting pictures of yourself. Don't post sexy photos or ones showing behavior you wouldn't want your mom, teacher, boss or potential college adviser to see.
- Don't send pictures of other people.
- Don't download content without your parents' permission.
(Julie Poppen writes for the Rocky Mountain News in Colo.)
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