Safe surfing

If people using Club Penguin, a social network site for younger kids, decide to get bossy or want to bully other members, they’re in for a surprise. The creators of the site, based in Kelowna, B.C., have adopted tight word filters on chat programs used by the “penguins,” the avatars younger kids use on the site.

If one person types “Scram you jerk,” he’ll be able to see his words appearing on his screen. But no one around him – represented on screen by penguins – will react. That’s because the site’s chat filters instantly block them from seeing a phrase containing flagged words or content, said site Communications Director Karen Mason.

Teens and adults can flirt and get raunchy with other members on sites like MySpace, but Club Penguin represents the opposite online pole. Its founders regularly screen the site to ensure younger users find a squeaky-clean experience and a place where even mildly suggestive names are banned.

Games can be played. Members can chat and send messages. But it’s all about clean fun and G-rated activities, Mason said.

Try to name your penguin anything remotely like “LuvBird” and the filters tell you to try again.

Using a real name when signing up is also not allowed. “We’re nothing like MySpace or Facebook,” said Mason. “The whole goal is to not allow our members to divulge personal information.”

While sites like MySpace buzz with more than 60 million members, Web hangouts for the younger set draw a much smaller population. Club Penguin, which was launched in 2005, has become the gold standard among sites catering to online users from 8 to 14 years old.

In Club Penguin, the young member chooses a penguin to be his or her avatar. The site offers places to hang out and meet other members. They can exchange comments and chat with each other. But an online moderator is always around to ensure no one gets abusive, Mason pointed out.

The company’s tech staff also monitor other Web networking sites to see if they can adopt new steps to ensure Club Penguin remains safe and private for users.

The site has no advertising, relying entirely on member subscriptions.

Parents of children who sign up have two options for their child’s online chat: standard or ultimate safe. In standard mode, players can type messages, but anything typed goes through a filter that will block phrases and terms that are deemed offensive or insulting.

In ultimate safe chat, the player only gets to select phrases from a predefined menu of greetings, questions and statements, Mason said.

Over time the safe chat filter has adapted and grown to respond to the inventive ways kids have of testing limits. Mason said some users have developed phrases that start with a part of a term, then introduce other words, but then conclude with the last half of a vulgarity or four-letter word.

“If you read the whole sentence on the screen, you might see the start of the word then see the rest of the word at the end of the sentence,” Mason said. The site filter now blocks those creative expressions designed to add a touch of raunch to penguin land, she said.

Mason said privately held Club Penguin doesn’t disclose how many members have signed up. It costs nothing to join, but members can upgrade to a paid subscription that provides the option of buying items to decorate their penguin’s igloo or acquire other game novelties.

Another common purchase is the adoption by members of a puffle, a fluffy virtual critter that’s supposed to be an ideal pet for penguins.

David Toddington, the father of two young children who play on Club Penguin, said he’s learned several lessons in online safety looking at how the site operates.

Toddington, a former British Columbia police officer, now runs a consulting and training business. His clients are often police agencies in Canada and the United States. Among them is the Idaho State Police, where Toddington has offered courses in online computer investigations.

After watching how kids interact on Club Penguin, Toddington said he’s impressed at how the site’s safety practices continue to evolve. He praised the embedded feature that blocks offensive words from being displayed on the screens of a bully’s targets.

“That’s very much based on the real world, where the strategy for dealing with bullies is to ignore them,” Toddington said. “Once you do, they tend to go away.”