Jessica*, aged 17, tells me: My 11 year old cousin has Instagram and her parents phoned in a panic recently. A random person tried to contact her and became a follower. Her parents were clueless about privacy settings and they didnt know what to do.

The 11-year-old accessed Instagram using a mobile phone. And this is the paradox: the safety benefits of being able to contact your child at all times are countered by the potential pitfalls of their having access to the internet.

And if a parent is unfamiliar with a platform such as Instagram, or Snapchat, they are just as likely to be unaware of its hazards.

As Managing Director of Private Clients at Digitalis, an an online reputation management company, I have worked on cases with harrowing consequences.

One that sticks in my mind is an incident where a female teenager was filmed as a boy performed a sex act on her. The video clip and still images, which captured a graphic and invasive close-up view, were then posted online. They quickly became the first search results for her name.

Many would be quick to criticise the actions of the teens involved. But when you answer the phone to a mother who can barely speak for weeping; there is no room for this sort of judgement.

She was so humiliated that it had taken several failed calls before she could bring herself to explain the situation to me. Her daughter was undergoing counselling and her family, friends and the local community were in turmoil as the news spread.

I would like to say this was an unusual case but it is more common than most would believe.

Social networking has enabled rapid sharing of information and we dont always have control over what is posted online by others. The information trail can prove very difficult to erase.

Claire*, 16, explains that her classmates are constantly uploading photos without consent.

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