Parents Guide to MySpace.com - How to Find Your Child's Profile

Start with a zip code search. This is one of the easiest way to locate your child. In small towns and rural areas, it is incredibly easy to locate children using this particular method. In larger zips, it helps to know how many miles you are from the “center” of your zip code as you can specify how many miles from a certain zip.

A zip code search is the most effective way to locate a profile because the zip code is the one thing a kid will NOT fake. Without your real zip, it is hard to locate new friends and dates. They may use an email address you don't know about and even a fake name (rapper type names are very popular), but they will almost certainly be listed under their correct zip code.

Browse through the photos and look for nicknames. Check your kid's school for matches.

Back Door Search Method: Here is a “back door” way to find your child's site. If you can't find your kid's site, search for their friend's names. If you can also find a friend of your child then look at their profile and check that person's friend list. Most profiles show the friends of the user.

You can narrow your search by age range, marital status, country, postal code and more. Try them all until you locate your child's profile or are reasonably sure they are not there.

If they aren't, count your blessings but you are not off the hook. You still need to talk about MySpace to your kids. It’s not going to go away. Sooner or later it will tempt them.

2. Browse MySpace Groups

Visit MySpace.com and click on the Groups button to view various chat groups. Remember, your child must be a member of a group to show up here. If you child has particular things he/she is very interested and active in (ie: a certain video game) this may be a good place to search.

3. Use the MySpace Search feature

Go to Myspace.com and click on the Search button. You have options for “Find A Friend”, “Classmate Finder”, and “Affiliations for Networking”.

4. Search Your Web Browser’s History

Everything that is viewed in a web browser (like Internet Explorer or Firefox) is stored in the browser’s cache (Temporary Internet Files) and in its History. Examining what your child has viewed on the Internet is a simple way to search for MySpace.com related pages.

To search the browsers history follow these steps:

In Internet Explorer, click on History button near Favorites on the Button Bar. A sidebar should appear showing you the different sites that have been visited in the last few weeks. Click on these sites (especially the MySpace.com ones and see what your child has been visiting on the web.

5. The Direct Approach: Ask your teenager to Show you their profile.

If they allow you to see it, you may be surprised how revealing some of the information might be.

6. Google Search

Go to google.com and type in the name of your child. Try it with quotes around their name to narrow the search. If you receive some results, browse through them and check for any MySpace.com pages that show up in the results.