A recent case of an Altoona man who police say used Facebook to pose as a teenager so he could befriend young boys sheds light on the perils of social media.

How exactly can parents know who their kids interact with on sites such as Facebook and where does the line between privacy and children’s safety fall when it comes to kids getting online?

“I get friend requests from people I don’t know, but I don’t accept them,” Altoona seventh-grader Trey Harkins, 12, said this week while doing homework with his friends at the Altoona Area Public Library.

Harkins said his father checks up on him on Facebook, which is alright with him since he doesn’t post anything on the social media site that would get him into trouble.

“I usually just post music videos,” Harkins said. It also isn’t lost on the 12-year-old that Facebook users are supposed to be at least 13 years old.

“I’m not proud to admit that I lied to make a Facebook account,” Harkins said.

“All you have to do is add two years to it when you put in your age,” Kyan Berry, 11, pointed out, adding that he doesn’t have a Facebook page and is happy not using social media at all.

Berry said his parents also have a hard and fast rule about the computer.

“Don’t download anything at all,” Berry said.

Michelle Grill, 12, said while she doesn’t have Facebook account, she does have her own laptop and uses Twitter and Instagram.

“I mostly post pics of me and my friends,” she said.

The kids said while they do use the Internet for homework sometimes, mainly to turn in work to their teacher through Google Documents, most of the time they spend on the Web is purely for entertainment.

“Just don’t do anything bad,” Berry said, a sentiment the kids said summarized their parents’ attitude about the Internet.

Kids are increasingly connected to the Internet, whether through a computer, a gaming console, a mobile phone, tablet, iPod or any number of devices that connect to the Web.

“Just the accessibility of the Internet makes it easier and increases the problems with it,” Altoona police Sgt. Brian Freiwald said.

Freiwald pointed out that easy access to the Internet also means easier access to children for predators.

“Children have to remember, just because they say she’s 12 years old doesn’t mean she’s a 12 year-old girl,” Freiwald said. “She could be a 67-year-old man. People can be whoever they want from behind a keyboard.”

Altoona police arrested 26-year-old Benjamin Richards on Sept. 3 after Richards allegedly pretended to be a 16-year-old boy on Facebook in an attempt to meet young boys. Richards allegedly began chatting with and tried to meet an Altoona 15-year-old, but because the boy’s mother started asking her son questions and ultimately looked at his Facebook messages, the meeting never occurred.

Now Richards is in Blair County Prison on felony charges of luring a child, due to appear Wednesday for a preliminary hearing at Central Court, and police are asking parents to check their children’s social media accounts and cellphones for possible contact with Richards.

Freiwald said the department’s Facebook post about Richards has reached 1.2 million people, with close to 19,000 shares.

Freiwald said there is often a knowledge gap between children and their parents when it comes to the Internet, and parents need to take up the responsibility of learning what they need to know to keep a watchful eye on their kids’ online activities.

“One of the most important things is to spend some time online with kids to show them what’s appropriate,” Freiwald said. Spending time surfing the Web with kids gives parents a sense of what their children look at online, he added.

Freiwald offered up some tips parents can use to minimize the risk, most important of which is to teach children never to disclose personal information online. By putting out information such as a home address, what school they attend and other information, children can make it easy for predators to track them down in person.

“An excellent practice is to never meet anyone or have them meet you without your parents’ permission,” Freiwald said.

Chat rooms should be off-limits and parents should know their children’s passwords so they can monitor email and other accounts, Freiwald noted.

“If their children have a problem with that, they shouldn’t be online,” Freiwald said.

Bill Latchford, a Tyrone father who also runs a resource Web site, protect

childrenonline.org, that deals with Internet safety issues and kids, said his 10 year-old daughter doesn’t know her passwords.

“If she logs herself out, she has to come to us,” Latchford said.

“The Internet is not the docile babysitter TV used to be,” Latchford said.

Latchford said that kids may complain about privacy, but as he sees it, there is no such thing when it comes to the Internet and a child’s safety.

“When it comes to online safety, privacy goes out the window” he said.

Latchford noted his daughter has an iPod and an Instagram account, both of which are closely monitored. As for Instagram, he and his wife control who has access to her pictures she posts.

They also restrict when she can use the Internet and her iPod doesn’t go to bed with her at night, Latchford said.

“If you monitor and monitor well what your kids are doing, being online can be advantageous to children for building socialization skills,” Latchford said, adding that he does a Google search of his daughter’s name regularly to keep an eye on her online presence.

“You can also set up a Google Alert,” Latchford said.

While there are applications and programs available to help parents control the content their children get from the Internet, like programs such as Net nanny, there is nothing more effective than just talking with your children and being an active part of their life, both online and off, Latchford pointed out.

At the Altoona Area Public Library, all computers with Internet access are monitored, Director Jennifer Knisely said. The computers are out in the open so staff can monitor them and software blocks out inappropriate content.

“We do have filtering software to protect the kids against accessing malicious and inappropriate content,” Knisely said, adding that with all the computers, including the four computers in the children’s room and four in the teen area, patrons have to take some steps before they can get online.

The library has a written policy all users must read and sign and children under 18 must have their parents sign the form. Children younger than 10 must have a parent with them and computers in the children’s area are restricted to kids 15 and under. The library also puts restrictions on how long people can use the computers and chatting isn’t allowed.

Ultimately, such rules can help keep kids safe no matter where they access the Internet, Freiwald explained.

“Set some boundaries,” he said. “Parents need to take responsibility.”