Education / 14 March, 2019 / Leo Bamford

The NSPCC on Keeping Your Children Safe on The Internet

Following on from my article on internet safety for children and being pretty horrified by the fact that you can easily search for porn using Alexa, more digging reveals that this is just the very start of it.

It seems to me we’re facing a huge problem as parents on the topic of internet security for children. I’ve made it a mission of mine to find out as much as I can for myself and our readers.  I interviewed NSPCC’s Child Safety Online Policy Manager Martha Kirby to find out what they’re doing about the problem, and to see if they had any words of wisdom for parents in this internet age.

Internet safety

The NSPCC are busy campaigning to make social networks safe for children. Their Wild West Web campaign outlines a detailed blueprint to outline how a robust independent regulator should enforce a legal duty of care to children on social networks.

Advice for parents

At the NSPCC we encourage parents to keep their children safe online and work as a TEAM by following four simple tips:

T – talk about staying safe online
E – explore their online world together
A – agree rules about what’s ok and what’s not
M – manage your family’s settings and controls

And repeat, making it part of your everyday life.

NSPCC and O2

• Net Aware – The NSPCC has joined forces with O2 to help parents understand online life as kids know it. We have worked with over 2,049 parents and carers, and 2,059 young people to review social networks and apps that children use.
• Advice Line – The NSPCC and 02 offer a free online safety advice line to parents. Advisors from O2 are trained by NSPCC to provide support and advice on privacy settings, parental controls, and apps, sites and games that children are using. Expert advisors can be contacted for free on 0808 8005002.

Other helpful resources