As some of you may already know, I’ve taken on a new role with software company BitDefender, helping to run a new online community for parent bloggers.
Safer Surfing is an online resource dedicated to helping families stay safe online. The site will provide non-biased technical advice for parents and bloggers, with a range of articles, blog posts, videos and tutorials, backed by the technical experts at BitDefender. If you've ever wanted to know how to help your kids use social networking safely, how to protect your blog from hackers, or what to do when you get an email you think is dodgy, Safer-Surfing is for you.
It’s not always easy to separate fact from hype when you’re online, so we're aiming to create a place where you can find sensible, trusted advice in plain English, as well as providing a space for members to share their tips and tricks.
Safer-Surfing will host regular blogs from me and other community members, along with a weekly Wednesday Workshop, where members can submit queries to be answered by the BitDefender team. We’ll also have a monthly workshop on Blogging Best Practice, and we’re working on a community project to produce a video to help keep kids safe online.
Our first project though, is a new anti-spam solution for WordPress. Having run WordPress blogs myself, I know that spam comments can be a real headache – so Safer Surfing members can download a new, free widget developed by BitDefender, that should block and reduce spam comments.
If you’d like to try it, head over to Safer Surfing and sign up. Once you’re approved, you can download the widget for free, and try it out. We’d love for as many people to try this as possible, let us know what does and doesn’t work for you.
If you've got any concerns or questions about online safety, family computing or blogging, I'd recommend you sign up to the community – we're always open to questions and if we don't know the anwers, we'll do our best to find someone who can help.
