Should parents put up pictures of their children on social networking sites ?

I have pictures of my kids up on any site I belong to, I enjoy showing them off and sharing their pictures. But I'm not on any site looking for a potential relationship. All of my sites are for finding friends only, I'm already married. I think you're right. If you're on a site looking specifically for love, you probably shouldn't have the kids pictures all over the place. Chances are you'll eventually meet a person from this site, and who knows what sort of danger your kids could be in then. But I personally never give out any information about myself over the internet like my phone number or address. So just because you see pics of my kids, doesn't mean you know where these kids are.

I can imagine using a picture of your kid as an avatar because you are a proud parent, but I would think twice if it was a dating site. It could give out a wrong idea, and if you want to make clear you have children then use a picture of you ánd the child but not just the child. I see where you are going with the pedofile thing, I am hoping you are indeed taking it to far but seriously I can't be sure on that one. Having pics of your kids in your profile seems fine if you want to show your family. I think you allways have to stay alert on which pics you put out in public though.

I enjoy seeing the children of my friends here. Then again, I'm not looking to date any of them!!! The one I saw was on one of the Entertainment news shows (Inside Edition or Entertainment Tonight) a few days back was of the cutest little 2 year old I have ever seen. Her parents had her dressed in a skimpy, thin TShirt & skimpy little panties. They had recorded her & posted on YouTube her dancing with Beyonce to her latest video. YES, it was precious. However, I could see some pedophile sitting there all excited watching this little girl. I felt horrified as I watched her twist & gyrate with Beyonce. She was very pleased with herself as her Mom & Dad were telling her what a wonderful job she was doing!!! I wondered if the parents were purposely putting her online for some of their sicko friends or if they were so freakin oblivious as to what they were setting her up for??? I could just hear them screaming about how the sick SOB needed to be put under the jailhouse!!! I went to YouTube to find the video so you could decide for yourself, but was unable to locate it. I pray the parents came to their senses & decided not to post it!!! It was way too seductive to be shown online...especially since the parent's names & the city where they live was given on national TV!!! I can just visualize some perv kidnapping this child & sexually abusing her. At 2 years old, she'd have NO chance to get away!!! Sometimes I wonder WTF parents are thinking when they do some of the things they do??? You can NEVER be too careful Ronny!!! With the situation you spoke of, I can see some perv trying to date the Mom just so he could meet her sexy daughter!!!

As a parent, i think it depends on a website, if it is only a friendster website, i think it's okey to let the children use it especially when there's a parent guidance. Friendster is one of the good websites that can help even an eight year old kid to communicate to their friends and relatives especially if their love ones are in the other countries... and Friendster is only for friends/relatives not for strangers...

Personally, this is a topic that I've thought a lot about myself. I just bought myself a brand new computer which of course has all the new bells and whistles. For the first time, I have the option of uploading a video or pictures of myself to various websites and or friends on the Internet. I personally decided to post a picture of myself here on Mylot just so that people knew who they were speaking with. I look at it like this: I will keep my personal information private, but I am also realistic enough to know that if someone is determined enough they will probably be able to match my picture up with personal information and eventually follow a trail to my name, address and phone number ETC. However, I refuse to live my life in fear. I will not make it easy for you to find who I am, but I'm sure it's possible if someone has such an inclination and time to put towards following my paper trail. With that being said, perhaps parents should be cautious of posting for the reasons you suggested in your original posting. It is not up to me, to decide what is right for everyone else though, just for myself. So, in the end I guess I don't have a problem with it as long as the parents show some discretion as to what they choose to reveal. Also, I think everyone needs to be a realistic in recognizing that there is indeed a certain level of risk involved and then to decide whether not they're willing to accept that risk. That's just my 2¢ worth. Happy Mylotting!

of course yes this helps the children to romance online, make unknown friends, help get threat calls and if you are lucky you can also get ur bank account hacked hehe...of course parents must not allow choldren

i do post my daughters pictures on my site but on private mode. only close friends can see them and but of course they know that it's my daughter and she's not the one who owns the site...

I think it depends on the situation. My myspace profile is public so I do not put any children's pictures on the site except pictures of me when I was a child. I am 53 years old and the picture I have as my default picture is of me when I was 3 year old. I am sure no one thinks that picture is of any little child in today's world. It is black and white and the clothing alone would tell anyone that the picture is very old. I have a photo storage account where I also have it set to private. I use it for uploading family videos so that other family members who do not leave close enough to see all the kids as they grow up can share in the videos. But I keep it to private and only close family members have access to the site. I have to trust them, though, to keep it private. There is no way to download the videos from the site so they cannot save them to their computers. If a networking site profile is totally private and only select friends can see the pictures, then I don't have a problem with putting kids' pictures on the site. But with that there are also some other stipulations. I would not put the pictures on if I also have my location where I live on the site as well. I would be very careful about anything I wrote on the site about where I live or where they live. And I would make sure that the pictures are set so that they cannot be saved to anyone else's computers. I don't think people think enough about the dangers of putting kids' pictures on the internet along with information about where they live. They should never put kids' pictures on along with the city name. It is too easy for photographs to show specific areas of a city, like a zoo or libray or park for instance, and that is just what pedophiles look for.

My youngest sister has two daughters. She has a MySpace and lives in another State from the rest of us so she puts "some" new pictures in there. I; after being active on the Internet for almost 10 years, would not put a child's picture on the Internet. For two reason. I know that someone who knows how to use Paint - can take pictures and super-impose them - change faces and all sorts of things. Secondly, it's far too easy to find people and the world is full of pedophiles.

The first thought that came to my mind is are you sure it is a picture of her child? Could it possibly have been a picture of her when she was a child? I know that the last picture that I had made that I liked even a little bet was when I was 15. However I would not use that picture to represent myself now but on the other hand I really wouldn't post any of my recent pictures because I think they all look hideous.

I don't like when people post photos of young people instead of theirs because they want the browser think that they are young instead of old.