By Peter Berton

CYBERSPACE – According to anti-virus firm Kaspersky Lab, children are more likely to encounter potential threats on social media websites than they are to seek out porn online.

During the first five months of 2013, Parental Control modules in Kaspersky’s anti-virus and anti-spyware products reported 31.26 percent of children surfing the web unsupervised visited social media sites; only 16.83 percent attempted to visit sites offering adult content. Another 16.65 percent of kids visited online shops. Kasperky researchers interpreted the data to mean social media sites represent the greatest potential risk for children being approached and enticed by online child molesters.

For the record, chats and forums held the No. 4 spot with 8.09 percent of unsupervised child traffic, web mail ranked No. 5 with 7.39 percent of traffic, and illegal software sites came in sixth with 3.77 percent of the traffic.

“In absolute terms, within the last month [May 2013] Parental Control modules registered more than 52 million attempts to visit social networks and more than 25 million attempts to access pornographic sites,” a Kaspersky statement noted. “This reflects an interesting shift, which sees pornography drop to second place behind social networks.”

The summary represents global statistics; results varied by region and country.

For instance, “In the USA, the pornography and erotica category leads the pack with 22.02 percent [of attempted traffic from unsupervised children]; online stores are in second place with 19.50 percent; next come social networks with 18.88 percent, enjoying almost the same popularity,” the statement said. “A similar situation exists in the UK, where the top three are exactly the same: pornography sites with 23.27 percent, online stores (19.59 percent) and social networks (16.14 percent). The only noteworthy fact is that children in the UK prefer casual games (5.94 percent) to chats and forums (4.84 percent).”

Similarly, “German children are the most likely to seek out online pornography (25.66 percent).” Second and third on German kids’ list were online stores at 20.68 percent and social networks with 18.29 percent.

“The situation in Japan has nothing in common with other countries,” the Kaspersky report observed. “The younger generation in this country tends to look for sites in the chats and forums category (34.25 percent). Apparently, these sites act as a good substitute for social networks, which are down in fourth position (10.59 percent). Besides, many popular Japanese web resources are created with tools designed for creating forums and blogs. Pornography and erotic sites take second position with 23.28 percent; online stores are in third with 16.89 percent.”

In all instances, Kaspersky Lab researchers cautioned parents to monitor their credit card bills and their children’s online activities — and, of course, to use parental-control software to protect their families from undesirables online.