Kids of all ages seem to enjoy conversing with friends through instant messaging or in chat rooms. Social networking sites, immensely popular with both kids and adults today, also offer a chat or IM function for users to enjoy.

Which is exactly why so many parents want to know how to monitor chat or IM functions - kids' Internet safety is in question when parents aren't aware of exactly who their children are chatting with.

Chat rooms are notoriously dangerous places where online predators approach kids, sometimes posing as young people themselves in order to gain the confidence of an unsuspecting or naive child.

And kids' Internet safety can also be threatened by other kids. Cyber bullies are one example where it would be very prudent for parents to monitor chat conversations.

Unfortunately, Instant Messaging and chat services don't usually leave a record in the computer where they happen, and combined with the unique IM language that many kids use, it can be hard for concerned moms and dads to know not only who their child is chatting with, but what is being said.

The best answer to this problem is to get some good quality parental control software.

The best parental controls will offer a variety of ways to protect kids online, including means to monitor chatting, and to block dangerous "friends" who use Instant Messaging to approach your child.

Quality is important with parental control software. Poor quality programs will be easy to detect and disable, making them useless in the long run.

The more sophisticated parental controls available today offer chat monitoring and blocking, as well as a means to monitor social networking sites and regular websites, and to block them if need be.

And total invisibility is important - older and more tech-savvy kids will quickly find a program that is more obvious.

Finally, make sure that when you monitor chat conversations the program organizes the data for you in a manner that is easy to read, and preferably accessible from a remote location.

This makes it much easier to maintain your kid's Internet safety in less time, and with less overall effort.

For parental control programs that offer some of these features and more, we suggest you take a look at our reviews for NetNanny, eBlaster, and our number one pick, WebWatcher.