Happy Father’s Day: Tips to Help You Become a Cyber-Savvy Dad in 2023

Dads always know how to put a smile on their children’s faces, but behind all the giggles, fun and games, dear old Dad also knows how to help kids pull through a difficult situation, in both the physical and digital worlds.

Fatherhood is no easy task and as the world continues to turn digital, your little ones need all the help they can get to avoid the constant stream of online threats.

As Father’s Day draws near, we roll out the red carpet and acknowledge the amazing dads that work ceaselessly to protect their children, offering support and handy advice under all circumstances.

Whether your kid is a toddler, a teenager or an adult, a parent’s duty to protect never seems to go away.

Here are Bitdefender’s top cybersecurity tips and topics for dads:

1.    Keeping personal information safe and maintaining a positive digital footprint

Online accounts, whether for an educational platform, social media outlet, gaming or video streaming app, hold sensitive information that can compromise the user’s privacy, security and financial wellbeing.

Begin promoting good cyber practices to your children that will help secure these accounts and safeguard their information as soon as they become adept at handling smart devices and playing games online.

This includes enforcing proper password management and using secure passwords, maximizing privacy settings, not oversharing information, and enabling additional security measures such as two-factor authentication, whenever possible. You can go through this list together and keep it as a go-to checklist whenever they set up a new account online. You can also go a step further and research/ analyze the privacy policy for every new app your child wants to use or install on the device, carefully filtering apps that may collect too much information that could be misused if compromised. Kids begin creating their digital identity so young nowadays. Ensure that children know why things they may post today could hurt their future. Once the information is public online, you can never take it back.

2.    Online interactions and cyberbullying

The internet can be a scary place for kids, especially when they interact with people who are not family or close friends. Kids can be highly trusting of the individuals they communicate with online. They may need constant reminders that people who go online may not be who they say they are. Kids may not fully understand the risks they expose themselves to, so emphasize how crucial it is for them not to share their contact information and location (phone number, email address, school or home address) or photos with strangers they may meet online. The block button should become your kids’ best friend, and they should begin monitoring and carefully filtering individuals in their “friend” lists.

Children under the age of 13 should not be using social media platforms, and dads definitely need to monitor the apps installed on their devices. When it comes to cyberbullying, anyone can fall victim.

You can turn to this dedicated article to help your child avoid online harassment and cyberbullying.

3.    Unsolicited correspondence and malware

Even the most cyber-savvy individual can fall victim to social engineering scams via email, text, and other forms of correspondence. Some online messages are not as conspicuous as others, and it’s important to teach kids from an early age how they can spot red flags and protect their information. Teach your children how to spot deceptive messages, reminding them to never share credentials or other sensitive information, including a credit card, and always ask for your permission and guidance when they are not sure of their next steps. Links in spam emails should not be taken likely, so emphasize the importance of using only official websites for content, streaming and downloading programs or games. When it comes to malicious files or attachments, make sure that your kids click or download them on their devices.

Even Dad needs some rest once in a while! This Father’s Day, let us take care of you and your children’s digital safety and devices with a free 30-day Bitdefender Total Security trial. You get all the perks to secure your family’s digital wellbeing, including some parental control features to guide you through your child’s online adventures.