With youths leading increasingly wired lives these days, it is no wonder that many of the mistakes they make also take place in cyberspace.
According to the latest statistics found on the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), 77 per cent of Singaporean households have access to the Internet.
Among the different age groups, the number of teens and youths who have online web access is even more significant. User penetration is at 90 per cent for those aged seven to 14, and the numbers are even higher at 96 per cent for those aged 15 to 24.
Singaporean youth are not only surfing the Web more regularly, most who spend time online do so on networking sites as well. A Straits Times survey of 100 teens found that 94 per cent of respondents maintain a profile on at least one social networking site.
Sites such as Friendster and FaceBook allow users to customize their profile pages and interacting with others in the network by uploading and sharing photos, among other features.
Given the freedom to do as they like in a virtual world with minimal parental supervision, inappropriate content uploaded by youths is not exactly a rare find in cyberspace. But it seems that teens are moving beyond peppering their sentences with swear words.
Just last week, two Singaporean girls posted their nude photos online. In the photo description on 21-year-old Faith Ong's Friendster page, she said that the pictures was to show others what a good body she has.
Teens who post their nude pictures may be doing so during a period of time when their emotions get the better of them, thus their inability to make good judgements and decisions.
Psychologist Dr Frederick Toke said, "Teenagers' emotions are like roller coasters, they go up and down and in supersonic speed.
"Many times in the midst of those rushes, life can become hazy as the mind just go spinning for these youngsters. It is usually during those emotional moments that made distinctions blurry between what is right from wrong, good from bad, safety from dangers and so on.
"Teenagers are usually focused on immediate and current issues. As such, having a long time view of consequences of their rash behaviours may not be something automatic for them.
"Teens who posed nude pictures of themselves on the internet are akin to those who drive their dads' cars like they are Lewis Hamilton on the streets.
"Sadly some of these kids may have to learn their life's lessons the hard way."
Not all sites ban adult content
AsiaOne did a check on several online services and found that while most sites do implement rules against offensive content, a number of sites allow uses to post adult content.
Social networking sites Friendster and MySpace have strict guidelines on photos users can upload. According to the terms of service on both sites, members who break the rules can find their user accounts terminated.
MySpace also has a page dedicated to informing teens, parents and educators of safety guidelines and a clear explanation of the service's security and privacy settings.
But the same cannot be said for a number of other networking and photo sharing services popular with teens in Singapore.
Yahoo-owned photo sharing site Flickr allows users to upload photos with adult content, although they must be flagged as either "moderate" or "restricted". While flagging is done at the user's own judgement, the pictures are still subject to moderation by other site members as well as Flickr's administrators.
Blogging services popular among teens, such as Google's Blogger and the Six-Apart owned LiveJournal however, allow all users to post adult content. Both sites are un moderated and only offer other users to flag pages as unsuitable for minors.
With so many avenues open for them to post inappropriate content and so few guidelines, the perhaps the best way to educate teens against doing something that they might regret later in life is to let them understand the potential consequences of such actions.
Said Dr Toke of such teens, "Family counseling and parental education would be most recommended."
