Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello,
does anyone have experience of setting up a Facebook account for their autistic child. My son is 16 and very keen to have an account but of course I’m worried about cyber bullying. Is there a way to set his account so that friend requests are restricted/monitored in some way?
sounds awful I know but we all know the world is not like a Disney movie, it does have some right nasty evil people in it
thanks
anxious Dad
the only way u can do it is to have his password then u can log in as him and check what is being said to him. Apart from that, which ur son probably wont agree to, teach him how to report to FB bullying activity and how to block someone.
Learn about privacy settings and help him set up the account so only his friends can post to him.
Set up your own account and practice posting to him, and him to you, so you can check how people see his account.
Check the latest IM (aka FB "Chat" aka FB "Messenger" ) settings -- FB has changed since i used it. Use ur account to see if u can IM him against his wishes.
Dont go on Face book before getting to know all the privcy settings first. Set up your account first before you set up his so u can check his as soon as he is on.
Learn FB. If he is in a wee group of friends dont worry too much, he will be savy in no time, and besides its good to learn something new. He will be able to join quiz groups and autistic groups and hobby groups.
You can have privacy settings that don't allow people to send friend requests. Can#t remember if it allows friends of friends. But you can set so complete strangers can't.
We made sure we educated our 7-year old daughter about internet security and forum & FB protocols and how bullying works.
We showed her how to set up fake accounts using internet pictures and using the address & telephone number of major landmarks - like the British Museum - it gets past all the verification checks and she could abandon any compromised profile if it got out of control. We taught her to never get in a fight on the internet - it's not real and trolls just exist to try to hurt people.
We saw many of her classmates crash & burn using their real identity online so they made it harder for their future self.
Our daughter, now at 21, has only recently set up a profile in her own name. She's INCREDIBLY internet savvy.