Teletimes April 2011.pdf

personal information for gifts,
register for club memberships,
sign up to receive games, and
give up personal information in
chat rooms. All of these information
fetching techniques are
affecting kids.
c. Exposure to inappropriate Images
and Content
The open nature of Internet
with regards to access of any
particular type of content is
what presently could be taken
as a very serious challenge to
protect our kids online. It’s as
simple as putting a sexual word
inside a search engine and getting
thousands of pages inviting
to browse the relevant content.
This exposure to inappropriate
images and content is more
unsafe in developing countries
like ours, where this upcoming
generation of teenagers has an
access to Internet at private
places like net clubs with no
restriction at all. Moreover, the
parents generally are almost unaware
of Internet and its usage;
thus they are not able to guide
their children about the pros and
cons of open Internet access.
Measuring the Child Online
Safety
Given the multitude of happenings
and activities related
to use of internet by Children,
concerns in regards to sufficient
and coordinated input, efficient
and effective processes for child
online protection arise, these
concerns should enlighten us in
terms of how well we are doing
and what else should be done.
Question arises, can we measure
the efficiency and effectiveness
of Child Online Safety? Here
comes the critical value of “process
indicators” that articulate
where do we stand and how to
improve on certain areas, what
areas need attention and how
to emphasize efficiency and
effectiveness to these areas. On
International forums, various
discussions and methodologies
are being developed on kinds of
data that need to be collected,
benchmarks that need to be
established? All of these issues
could be tackled through coordinated
approach.
Survey on Child Online Protection
Assessment in Pakistan
(Oct 2010)
M/s Paradigm Technologies
(private research company) carried
out survey in Oct 2010 to
assess and investigate Internet
usage and its trends among age
group of 8-18 years. The survey
was carried out inline with ITU’s
indicators outlined in “Child
online protection CoP Initiative”.
The survey also measured
and evaluated online risks and
opportunities.
A sample size of 1,127 was
considered. Sample size included
717 Parents and guardians, 300
teachers and 200 kids. The
samples were collected through
a face-to-face interaction
through a survey form and also
through online survey form. The
key findings of the survey are
summarized below along with
graphical representation.
According to the survey, home
Internet access to children is
quite high. 89% of the survey
participants told that their kids
in different age groups are using
Internet at home. The interesting
fact is that young children
from 8-14 age groups are having
a growing usage pattern for the
Internet which shows a requirement
for evaluating the ‘Child
Online Protection’ policy framework
inside the country.
Several questions were asked
to measure the level of attention
parents confer to assess the
online activities of their children.
Responses show that generally
parents are not attentive
towards the online issues that
are putting their children at risk.
They are also not interested in
monitoring their children online
habits at large, the primary reason
behind could be the lack of
time and lack of general awareness
among the parents. This
really is an alarming situation
requiring immediate intervention
from both public and
private institutes to enable safe
Internet access to our young
users.
A couple of questions were
exclusively asked from the
kids to judge their Internet
activities, frequency of their
Internet activities and about
their contact with inappropriate
online content. The kids were
mainly segregated as daily and
weekly users. Results indicate
that children between the age of
8-18 years use Internet on daily
or weekly basis, 88% use it to
do school / college work, 82%
for playing online games and
78% use it to get information
for other things.
Almost six out of every ten,
cumulatively (53%) have come
in contact with pornography,
34% have accidently found
themselves on a pornographic
website, 31% received pornographic
junk mail by email or
messenger and 30% have seen a
pornographic pop-up advertisement
while browsing Internet
sites.
In order to verify the interest of
the parents to monitor online
activities of their children and
the assumptions in children’s
mind, few questions were asked.
Parents are generally unaware
of their responsibility to manage
their children’s internet use, only
31% of them ask their children
about their online activities, or
monitor it themselves. Similarly
responses of children also imply
that their parents are not much
bothered about their Internet
usage.
The last question of the survey
inquired as what would be the
priority action that they want to
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