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A NEW SURVEY has revealed that at least one in every five children have seen potentially dangerous content online, including websites which promote anorexia and suicide techniques.
About 14 per cent have also been exposed to sexual images while browsing the Internet.
According to research commissioned by the EU Kids Online network, eight per cent of 11- to 16-year-olds saw pornographic images of people having sex and/or genitals, while two per cent saw violent sexual images.
Almost one third of all children who had seen such images said they were upset by them.
Worryingly, the report also found that reporting tools were not effective for those who were affected by what they see online. In relation to pornographic images, about one quarter just “hoped the problem would go away”. Another 22 per cent tried to fix it themselves, 19 per cent deleted unwelcome messages and 15 per cent blocked the sender. Only 13 per cent reported the problem online, but most found the results unhelpful.
The researchers for ‘Towards a better internet for children’ said one of their strongest conclusions is that “existing reporting tools do not work”. They say that the industry needs to “do much better” given that only one in ten children reported their problems through an online mechanism.
Members of the Internet industry will gather today at a European Commission-backed meeting to discuss current efforts to keep children safe online. The report is recommending more focus on child-friendly communication and accessible tools.
Parental worry
Parents continue to worry about what their children are at risk of when they spend time online. Being contacted by strangers or seeing inappropriate content remain high on a list of day-to-day concerns – ahead of alcohol, drugs and getting into trouble with police.
Children also revealed that they were dissatisfied with the help received from online services after reporting problems, such as sexting or cyber-bullying, with contacts met through the Internet.
“Given the relatively low take-up of online reporting mechanisms, there is considerable scope for further promoting their availability, age-appropriateness and use,” says Sonia Livingstone, one of the lead researchers.
Parental mediation is also important, she added. Doing shared activities online or encouraging children to learn things on their own but remaining available if needed reduces the probability of exposure to online risk. Such methods have also been linked to decreased experiences of harm among nine- to 12-year-olds - without reducing the many positives of online activity.
However, those with more digital skills are more likely to encounter content-related risks.
Social networks
Of those surveyed, more than one quarter have a public social networking page with no privacy settings. Less than half keep their profiles private, while 28 per cent have set them to partially private. The research found that children who have their profile set to public are also more likely to display their phone number or address online.
According to the authors, more efforts are needed to promote the use of privacy settings and make them user-friendly.
Children are more likely to have a public profile if they cannot understand or manage the privacy settings, if they are a boy, if their parents have banned their SNS use, or if they experience psychological difficulties.
Ireland was placed in the ‘Lower use, some risk’ category along with Portugal, Spain and Turkey. Higher risk countries include Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Ireland also has one of the highest levels of parental monitoring and filtering and one of the higher levels of private social network pages.
Other key figures:
Irish figures:
The research, which can be downloaded in full here, was funded by the EC Safer Internet Programme and led by the London School of Economics. EU Kids Online conducted a face-to-face, in-home survey of 25,000 nine- to 16-year-olds across 25 countries, including Ireland, for the survey.
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There are tons of free family protection software out there, no excuses for parents.
The other simple rule – have the computer in a shared room like the front room, kitchen etc. where you can keep an eye on the usage.
Also check the history of the browser, if it’s been cleared you probably have a problem.
I’m with you jim. I’d also give time limits like with tv. They should be outside getting exercise
@Ithchy Sorry red thumbed there, I completely agree with you. Yes it’s important for kids to learn to use the internet but more important for them to be active and healthy outside. Building an immune system and having a healthy childhood is more important for their future.
If the Internet didn’t exist then I doubt we’d even have a tv. We grew up outside. I think it’s a bit sad seeing kids stuck on tv all day
Set up a separate user profile on your computer for your kids and give yourself full admin rights and restrict theirs. (im not 100% but i think you can prevent deleting history) Then set the security settings on your browser to high. Even for a parent with little computer knowledge this is simple enough.
The days of having a “family computer” in a shared room are pretty much over. Most ‘net access by children is via smart phones / iPod Touch / tablet so it’s not that simple. I can only assume that others who make blanket statements about blaming parents or thinking they can monitor their children 24/7 either don’t have children themselves or they don’t know what their own children are _really_ up to… :-)
I don’t have kids, but the shared computer thing will definitely be happening when I do. Mainly because I’m incredibly cheap and having one family computer/one family TV is also financially preferable.
@nick Good luck with that.
Then keep them off the Internet.
You can’t keep children from using the internet. For all its problems and the bad intent behind the way some people use the internet. It is possibly one of the most important inventions of all time. If kids don’t learn and adapt to using it, they will be poorer for it in the future.
Blanket banning anything will never work. This is about parents being responsible. Yeah its is easier just to ban them from using it, but the fairer and more reasonable way is to completely monitor what they are looking at. Its simple. Get their passwords for facebook and what ever other social networking sites they use. Buy a good monitoring programme, set a password so that only you can erase internet history. These are all simple and effective steps at keeping your kids safe.
And you do this how??? What a well thought out, massively well informed comment!!! Jesus Christ, the Internet is everywhere. They study computers from primary school!!! Monitoring is the only option.
Shut down the Internet!
Or learn to use it before you let your kids use it.
Good job illustrating a study about 11 – 16 years old with an image of a 4-6 year old.
I can’t say I am shocked or surprised by any of this. We are talking up to 16 year old here – they are kids, sure, but well into puberty and walking bags of hormone. This is NORMAL. Are there teenagers who are not curious about sex?
Looking at the Irish figures:
Only 8% have a public social networking page? Wow, 92% have privacy set up and managed- that’s great! Quite possibly some of the remainder know too, and for one reason or another have a public profile somewhere – remember it’s quite likely that they have more than one profile anyway. I know 16 year olds with Linked In profiles, or who are managing public Facebook pages as well as their private ones.
7% have seen naked people (Shock!) and 6% have seen people having sex (Horror!). Seriously, is this is supposed to be surprising in some way? Actually, when I think about it, it is VERY surprising. Look at it this way: In pre-internet days, what proportion of teens who had the opportunity to look at a copy of a ‘dirty magazine’ did so? I’d say it approached 100%. With the internet everyone has the opportunity, pretty much, and over 90% didn’t look? Truly amazing.
The 4% who have looked at ways to commit suicide is sad and shows how much kids need to be supported and to be made aware of what help is available to them. However it also means that 96% are not interested enough to look up such a thing, which is good.
You can’t wrap kids of this age in cotton wool and hide the world from them. It isn’t even a good idea to try. What you can do is talk to them, openly, and make sure they are savvy enough to deal sensibly with what they see and behave sensibly online and offline.
Point to Ponder:
When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life. — John Lennon
Story Line: Poem from Kahlil Gibran* about Children
Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
Parents fault.
Only parents fault.
innocence sees beauty even in dark souls
innocence has belief to calm brutal beasts
innocence is a sacred gift easily forfeit lost
innocence has faith to restore hardened hearts
innocence has vision to invoke creative remedies
innocence is a unique seed of passion harmonies
innocence has truth to see path to restorations
innocence has patience to work new miracles
Not all kids are innocent… You walk home in Dublin at night time from work and there’s a good chance you will see an “innocent ” child throwing a glass bottle at you or torturing a stray animal
That’s why mine are not and will not have access to the Internet on till they are much older. It never did us any harm and we all adjusted to the great benefits the computer and Internet has to offer. That is also why my children won’t have FaceBook pages etc on till they are the right age
have your say