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Working on a clients PC - Found some videos that a preteen probably shouldn't be watching...

D

dman

Diamond Member
I'm thinking this is probably a repost... but... it's my turn to face the problem in real life:

So, I'm working (at my house) on another persons PC and I find some Faces of (you know) graphic videos and (vanilla) porn on there. I was originally asked to see if it needed any upgrading (they wanted some RAM and a new harddrive to speed it up). So, I'm checking it out and cleaning off the spyware and checking for temp stuff taking up space I found the stash not really hidden. It looks like it was downloaded with a P2P program (all signs point to that and not a virus/trojan).

The boy who downloaded it is probably 10-13 somewhere in there, I really don't know for sure. I'm sure it was just curiosity but do I tell the mother or not? (She's divorced and theres no Dad around that I'm aware of). The PC is in a public area of the house but he found time to download it when no one was monitoring him. I wasn't asked to look for any of that stuff, and it wasn't well hidden but the Mom probably would never have found it... so I dunno. If I don't say anything, am I responsible in some way if he gets into trouble? At least morally and ethically I'd think yes.

Ugh. The boy in me says not to tell but the Dad in me says maybe he needs to at least have a talk w/ an adult and I should mention it as a reason the PC was running out of space. BTW, The Dad side of me is winning by a fair amount but figured I'd ask the folks here their thoughts maybe I'll get talked out of breaking the news. I plan to do so tomorrow.

Lastly, any good sites or threads that talk about firewall/parental control stuff... If I do spill the beans then that's going to probably be the next question--how do I block him from this. This isn't just for this case, I have another person interested in a software solution as well. Something that's easy to use and cheap and does a decent job of blocking chat and p2p and other potentially bad stuff.

PS. No Pics or Videos to share, but feel free to search here

I'll update thread with what happens tomorrow eveningish.

[edit] So I spoke to her today, broke out what I saw and made it seem not so bad. She was glad I told her and didn't make a big deal about it. She still wants to buy her son a new PC for the holidays too, so, I don't think he's going to get in any trouble. All in all I think I did the right thing for this situation. [/edit]
 
Originally posted by: Rage187
Originally posted by: Mik3y
sux for that kid. you should teach him how to hide the files and encrypt them! 😛
Click to expand...



/agree, teach the kid how to hide the good stuff.
Click to expand...

And get him off the vanilla porn. Butterscotch is a much better flavor of porn.
 
i say tell the mother. being a single parent, im sure she would appreciate the heads up. and you breaking the news will probably ease the brunt on the boy as opposed the her finding it herself.


yes, boys will be boys, but what happens when he dls that dialer and runs up a $1000 phone bill? sure she can have it taken off, but that boy will be up sh!t creek then.
 
When you are in doubt as to your ethics professionally, always remember the 2 rules.

1. never allow anything that might corrupt the data or harm the system.All it'll take is one nasty virus or trojan and bam! there goes mom's Quicken and Turbotax data and her year's worth of ebay transaction records.Most home users don't backup regularly.

2. your loyalty must go to the one signing your check.... I would delete the stash and get rid of all file sharing app's. I'd tell mom but would probably also stress that it wasn't anything weird and that such experiementation is normal. Talk more about how very important it is to use a good anti-virus, to regularly backup data and to scan d/loaded files before running them.



I like Panda software for anti-virus/firewall.
 
Not your concern or even business. You glossed over it a bit, I suspect you were being a bit nosy in the first place. I certainly wouldn't tell the parents... I probably wouldn't snoop around enough to find it anyway.
 
I'd say talk with the kid ya damn self about it, assuming you're at least remotely friends with the mom (which you'd better be, doing Tech support @ home). Just have a good man-to-man and tell him to compress the files at least when you run out of space.
 
Originally posted by: Gurck
Not your concern or even business. You glossed over it a bit, I suspect you were being a bit nosy in the first place. I certainly wouldn't tell the parents... I probably wouldn't snoop around enough to find it anyway.
Click to expand...

well.. hunting for spyware and crap tends to lead to some snooping...

but this reminds me of the time I went out on a a work order, was there to get the internet connection up and running. In the recent documents listing... was some word files... and porn, pics and vids. I nearly fell to the floor.. because it belonged to a fairly attractive girl 🙂
 
Delete it, make the kid download it again. And hope the mother doesn't come back and ask you why you deleted all of her porn. 🙂
 
Get sneaky.........
Corrupt the install, do not uninstall it. make it there, but broken. This is easy enough to do😛 Explain that some virus got into the computer, probably from some filesharing p2p app that USED to be on there, and most everything works now. Not really worth the time to reinstall the OS. See if you can talk loudly enough about it around the suspected porn-dogg that he has to overhear it.
😀
 
I'm a single mom w/teen son, here's my reaction:

tell the mom, but do it from a technical standpoint - she & kid need to learn about the downside of downloading, large-file storage, and the kind of tech sleaze that often accompanies this stuff. They both need to be educated about what is happening inside that computer.

If the kid isn't willing to learn about computer safety, he shouldn't be protected from the effects of his exploits.

If the mom is upset by the vanilla porn, that's for her & jr. to work out.

BTW, if you found really nasty hard-core stuff, that would be different.
 
Eh, let the kid have his fun. It should be the mother's responsibility to be a "mom" and catch him doing it. A little softcore porn never hurt anybody. Heck I remember when magazines were fun. 😀
 
If it's vanilla then leave it be.

If it's chocolate elephants banging midgets then do the right thing. Send me a copy.
 
Originally posted by: Gurck
Not your concern or even business. You glossed over it a bit, I suspect you were being a bit nosy in the first place. I certainly wouldn't tell the parents... I probably wouldn't snoop around enough to find it anyway.
Click to expand...

 
Originally posted by: mobobuff
Originally posted by: Gurck
Not your concern or even business. You glossed over it a bit, I suspect you were being a bit nosy in the first place. I certainly wouldn't tell the parents... I probably wouldn't snoop around enough to find it anyway.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...

Sort of was the job... to tune up / clean up the PC so they don't have to buy a new one or waste money upgrading that which they don't need. It was not hidden at all, just ran across it doing a treesize to see what the biggest space wasters were.

Anyway, I'm going to tell the mom I found some files, etc... after reading the mixed comments I agree more with those who suggest I break it out technically and just give the heads up.
 
Originally posted by: Geekbabe
When you are in doubt as to your ethics professionally, always remember the 2 rules.

1. never allow anything that might corrupt the data or harm the system.All it'll take is one nasty virus or trojan and bam! there goes mom's Quicken and Turbotax data and her year's worth of ebay transaction records.Most home users don't backup regularly.

2. your loyalty must go to the one signing your check.... I would delete the stash and get rid of all file sharing app's. I'd tell mom but would probably also stress that it wasn't anything weird and that such experiementation is normal. Talk more about how very important it is to use a good anti-virus, to regularly backup data and to scan d/loaded files before running them.



I like Panda software for anti-virus/firewall.
Click to expand...


Once again, Geekbabe is 100% correct.

I would definately mention it to the mom. Absolutely. Preteen... yes.

I would bet that she would like to be able to keep a eye on the kid. She is a single mom and although it is not your responsibility to parent her kid or tattle on him, I would bet that she would really appreciate it. It is rough being a single parent.

And I use Panda Internet Security, too. It kicks azz.

🙂
 
Well, I dunno... I've done spyware cleanings and such for people and not had to ogle their hard drive. If someone's running out of space I'd tell them, ask them what they could do without.. not go snooping. But maybe that's just the nature of that particular job, who am I to say... at any rate it's beside the point, it's still not your place and could come back on you. The bearer of bad tidings is often the one blamed in the mind of those receiving the news.. doesn't make much sense, but it doesn't have to - people are stupid. Plus unless this squirt was using BT - and it doesn't sound like he would know how - he couldn't have all that much pr0n that it alone was a significant factor in the drive running out of space. Most p2p networks mostly have dialup AOLers and the like, and the porn comes in really slow from them. ... or so I hear ... 😱
 
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