I ran across a site under the url MyReputation.com that offered a bunch of monitoring services to watch your name, kid’s names or company brand.  I was suddenly disheartened to see the costs associated with the “service” you can do for free.  Let’s focus on ReputationDefender for MyChild since this blog covers a lot on kids and privacy.

MyChild by ReputationDefender scours the Internet for all references to your child or teen – by name, photography, screen name, or social network profiles – and packages it to you in an easy-to-understand report.

There is the first issue in that you can do this exact same ability yourself with simple tools like 123People right now.  They sell this service from $14.95/month to a 2-year plan for $238.80.  Wow!  All of this in a report that they then want you to purchase ‘Destroy” assistance for $29.95 if something is ever found about your kids you don’t like.

Listen here parents, pay close attention.  You cannot ever fully destroy it all once it shows up online due to all the social aggregators.  I don’t know how to make that any clearer.  If you have discovered your child has put inappropriate content out there, more than likely it is now cached, stored or shown in another online service that feeds from it (an aggregator)

The FAQ alone should scare you enough from paying money for such services.  They can’t guarantee to remove anything, they skate by the fact that their searches are basically the same as anyone else.

Now I am not saying that the people running the site are attempting to scam anyone, I am saying the cost associated to the service is since you can do this on your own for free.  There is no reason you cannot watch your child’s activities.  I will start making a list of some sites you can utilize instead to keep a constant flow of updates on their postings.