Santa Standards

Toys R Us Santa Letter Site Fraught With Concerns

admin — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 03:56:27 +0000

Keep your kids away from Toys R Us’ Santa letter site. There are no safeguards whatsoever and their first order of business is email capture. Given that no credit card information is part of the site they are not obligated by PCI laws to keep any data submitted there secure — meaning that anyone working for Toys R Us has working for them can not only access the data — they can use it!

Because Toys R Us is a natural draw for children and indeed could be attractive to them there is a predatory caution we must convey about this site. Do NOT allow your children to access ToyRUs online.

Emails to Santa at Santa.Net Result in Spam

admin — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 14:45:58 +0000

Several parents have forwarded emails sent from santa@santa.net that provide three links — all leading to spam, commercial websites or virus-laden web pages. The email is a bot-generated and dated in auto-response style from 2010. The santa@santa.net email address likely gets thousands of blind emails a year.

Parents would be advised to avoid not only sending email but visiting the links associated with the site Santa.net.

A Roadmap for the Future of Santa Standards

admin — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 05:43:43 +0000

This website represents years of development. It the result of thousands of conversations amongst those of us “in the Christmas business” as we have wondered how we could elevate the image of Santa Claus and keep kids safe online.

We finally reached a point where we just can’t talk about it any more. We have to do something. Santa Standards is something.

What you see here today is just a beginning. Our goal is to reach, rate and elevate every Santa resource we can find. For today, what you see is the low hanging fruit of Santa Claus online — the popular kid-attractive venues that get the most attention year in and year out from the Santa-loving crowd.

There is so much more to be done.

Here, in a nutshell, are future projects related to Santa Standards:

1. Santa services websites: we will visit and review every website selling services related to Santa Claus. It could be Santa letters, it could be videos, phone calls or any other kind of Santa-related product. We will review these products. And we will review how Santa is portrayed in every way.

2. Professional Santa Claus portrayers who operate their own websites present a special challenge. Many of these men and women (Mrs. Clauses) work on a volunteer basis and the Internet is an inexpensive way to advertise their services. Some of these individuals are compensated for their time in commercial settings and use the Internet to conduct their business. How can we help them sustain the positive image of Santa Claus so important to them, their customers and to Santa Standards? We’re going to take that big assignment on.

3. Santa in the media will also be reviewed whereever we can find it. Movies, plays, music, videos, online productions and in every way we see Santa represented to children will be watched by us. And we’ll post what we learn right here.

Why all this effort?

Because Santa Claus is better than the world is giving him credit for. In fact, many are abusing his good name. We’re trying to get it back.