Teach children online safety ‘soon as they pick up device’

Children should be taught about online safety and digital citizenship “as soon as they pick up a device”, according to a leader researcher on an international study which indicated some vulnerable young people can fall prey to online predators.

The report on online child sexual abuse by a team at Middlesex University London incorporated input from gardai and from young Irish adults. It also looked at data from the UK, Italy, and the Netherlands and found that while young people are engaging online as never before and police forces are struggling to catch up with the challenges that arise.

Overall, the study found the vast majority of respondents ‘never’ had to deal with sexually explicit online requests, while a minority of around 16% of those surveyed said they had received such requests ‘often’ or ‘sometimes’.