Highlight 3/2022 – How can governments protect children from the dangers they face online?
Annalisa Baruffi, 21 January 2022
Young people are increasingly connected. Internet and social media accessibility is growing up. In a 2019 Report, UNICEF highlighted that 1 child out of 3 worldwide is Internet user (under 18 years of age).
The world wide web accessibility has enlarged the possibility to reach information and opened the door to new opportunities to improve peoples’ social condition. The rapid expansion of broadband (fixed and mobile) in the developing world is bringing a lot of benefits to children and youth and is accelerating the economic growth of the countries. Nevertheless, it is putting millions of children at risk.
Threats vary according to age, gender and country of origin. However, we can identify common and transversal risks concerning an increasing number of minors. Among them, UNICEF detects self-harm content, suicide content, hate speech, violent content, sexual content, being treated in a hurtful way. Moreover, there is a global debate around the misuse of data by large social media platforms. Their widespread global presence makes difficult for the States to impose any form of regulation. To all this is added the lack of literacy in the use of online platforms, from social media to video game, increasing the risks that children may encounter.
Responses put in place by governments to protect minors vary across countries. We can identify different approaches that provide different forms of protection : from the surveillance to the outright censorship. Some countries adopt censorship measures for specific content. Other countries adopt restrictive measures limiting the ability to access websites and social media.
Exercising internet control is typical of authoritarian countries who decide the content that can circulate online. This can be a way to protect children but the main aim of such measures is limiting the freedom of speech and of thought, thus preventing threats to existing power structures.
In democratic countries, the most common protection system is online contents surveillance, eliminating what may be dangerous and harmful to children. However, establishing mechanisms which enable governments to control data and information, with the complicity of the platforms, is a slippery slope. These mechanisms leave room for increasingly frequent restrictions on freedom of expression and personal data violations even in consolidated democracies. Governments that have the power to access and restrict contents can easily abuse these powers and exercise control over the population, triggering mechanisms of control and limitation of liberties.
Data tell us that the uncontrolled use of social media by kids continues to claim victims. Moreover, is widely documented the parents’ lack of literacy and digital skills which affects their educative and protective role. Parents have not always the technological skills to adapt digital device to the age of their children, installing specific protection programs or limiting the access to dangerous website. Moreover, they are often not aware of the risks that minors face online and refrain thus from implementing appropriate educational and control strategies.
Therefore, it should be asked: is the current control strategy effective in protecting minors?
If we really want to protect the most vulnerable, we need a collective effort to give minors and their legal guardians the tools needed to understand, prevent and manage online dangers. It is necessary to implement educational programmes that will instruct children how to benefit from the online environment, avoid threats and ask for help in case of violation. The use of the internet belongs to the daily life of the new generations. A part of their relationships take place online, through social media. Many of them are unaware of the consequences, even legal ones, of online behaviours. School curricula need to be rethought in order to include educational activities on the proper use of internet and digital safety.
On the other hand, the adults (parents, teachers, educators) should be trained to recognize signals of discomfort in children and youths and to appropriately respond to them. Social services can play a fundamental role to support parents and children facing threats due to misuse of internet platforms. Psychological counselling services, legal consultation and social support must be made available to both adults and youth. It is necessary to provide public services with professionals specialized in the management of problems related to the misuse of internet.
We don’t need to restrict freedoms but teach future’s adults how to make the most of their freedoms! And governments must guarantee fundamental human, civil and social rights that ensure the survival of democracy.
Annalisa Baruffi, Highlight 3/2022– How can governments protect children from the dangers they face online?, available at www.meig.ch
The views expressed in the MEIG Highlights are personal to the author and neither reflect the positions of the MEIG Programme nor those of the University of Geneva.