Question about Myspace

ROE

New Member
I admit that I am a mom that snoops from time to time. I'm not sorry that I do, I've learned some important things from snooping.

Anyway my 16 year old difficult child has a blog on Myspace as do his brothers and all of his friends. I like to check it out from time to time. He has shared it with me on occassion but not lately. It seems the only time I can get into his account is if he forgets, and leaves it open. He now has it set to "private setting" I have to be on his buddy list to view it (like that's going to happen lol)or I have to know his username and password.

Does anybody know if there is a way around this?
 

hearts and roses

Mind Reader
There really is no way around it. If you're listed as a friend, then you can see his profile. If you're not listed as a friend, then forget about it.

I have a myspace and can see my easy child's page. I used to see difficult child's until we made her delete her profile.
 

klmno

Active Member
As bad as this is, I use by son's "history" bar to see what he has been on, then click on it, and sometimes that leads me right to the page I want to see, or less often, to the page that lists his username and password. It makes me feel guilty but it has given me a lot of insight to what is going on with him.
 

klmno

Active Member
The previous reply wasn't meant to imply that we don't have computer issues- I put a lock on the door to the room with the computer and my son kept breaking in, then I password protected everything and he found a way around it, then I had to talk to Dell to redo a "thing" on the mother board inside the hard drive becuase he put a password on the computer to even start it up, then I had to reload Windows, and now, I'm having to replace the hard drive. My son knows a lot about computers, but not everything and not as much as he thinks, so it is a real challenge. I've lost the battle on porno and chatting with people he doesn't know. I'm currently battling ordering things on-line- with my credit card- and not giving personal info out online.
 

Nancy

Well-Known Member
Do you know the password to his email account? If you do then click on the "forgot my password" link and they will email the password to his email account. You can go read it and then permanently delete the email.

The only other way I know of is to install keystroke monitoring software on the computer so you can go in and read what is written.

Nancy
 

Arttillygirl

New Member
I told my difficult child that the only way he could have a myspace is if I have the password.
He's changed it a few times but I just do the forgot password and I get it.
So far so good but I would recommend that as a ground rule for getting one.

Brenda
 

missdot

New Member
there is a way around it. Only know because my brother-in-law did it to his daughter. You have to get a key logger. That will memorize every key (password) pushed into the computer. Don't know how exactly, but he was able to do it and busted his daughter for some things he felt were inappropriate. Its best to try to stay one step ahead of them.
 

nlg319

New Member
I randomly tell my daughter I want to see her MySpace...at a time when she is not on the computer. So we go together to the computer and she brings it up while I'm standing there so she doesn't have time to delete or erase stuff. I told her that unless I can view it from time to time, she wasn't going to have one. This way she never knows when I will want to look!
 

Mikey

Psycho Gorilla Dad
One other way is to set up your own ficticious MySpace account, then ask to be his "friend". Yes, this is sneaky, underhanded, and may even violate the terms of service for MySpace (but who cares, they're not supposed to let underage kids have pages, but they do).

The best way to do this is to get on his MySpace page and see who his friends are, and then slowly work your way into his friends list through them (a lot of kids will simply accept any request to become a "friend"). That way, you can eventually ask to be added as a friend to your difficult child's site - when he checks your profile, he sees that you're already friends with other people he knows.

If you can do this, it's better than a keylogger (which has both legal and ethical, and ODD problems, if your difficult child discovers it). The same goes for any other "forensic" tools that are marketed to parents these days (like screenshot snappers, etc). Unfortunately, if a computer is properly protected against virus and malware attacks, these programs get picked up and deleted in the next scan. If your computer isn't properly protected, and you have a kid cruising the net then you probably have (or soon will have) problems with an infested computer, and the snooping programs may not work right anyway.

I also like the idea above about using the "forgot your password" option if you know his email password. The only problem with that is it's possible that MySpace logs the date/time when you log in; if so, your difficult child could discover that "someone" is logging in to his site.

But if you truly feel the need to access his page, then you have many ways to do it. If you feel you must install some kind of snooping program, my suggestion is that you hire a local consultant to come in and do it for you, and show you how it works.

Hope this helps.

Mikey
 

Nancy

Well-Known Member
That's what a meant when I said to get a keystroke monitor. It will give you everything typed, passwords, IM's, emails, etc.

easy child Tattletale is the one I use and I like it a lot. It runs in stealth mode so it is hidden.

Nancy
 
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