Category: Cyber Resilience and Internet Safety

curricular area and keeping learners safer online

cyber toolkit inappropriate content

Consume: inappropriate content

Almost half (47%) of internet users report coming across a potential harm while using social media, as opposed to news services (3%) and gaming platforms (2%) with these harms being the most reported (in terms of potential consumption harms):

  • hateful, offensive or discriminatory content (64%)
  • animal cruelty (62%)
  • generally offensive or ‘bad’ language (62%)
  • content which negatively impacted on a user’s self-esteem (61%)
  • and misinformation (61%)

(Ofcom, 2022)

 

back to Consume

 

 

There is a disparity between the ‘harms that people are most concerned about and the actual incidence of them occurring’.
Although people say they are concerned about some potential online harms, the harms which most internet users are concerned about tend to be those with the lowest incidence.

Users are most concerned about content depicting the sexual abuse or exploitation of children (86%) and content encouraging extremism, radicalisation or terrorism (79%) but less concerned about generally offensive or ‘bad’ language (41%) and
unwelcome friend/follow requests or messages (42%).

 

Read Life on the small screen: What children are watching and why (ofcom.org.uk)

Internet safety risks and considerations

Access

In order to consume online content and potentially inappropriate or harmful content, learners usually need access to:

  • an internet-connected device
  • platforms or services, providing the content

When supporting learners with this area, it is important to consider who controls their access to these opportunities and resources:

  • Is there a risk of this occurring in school?
  • How is that enabled?
  • Are there steps that could be taken to reduce the risk of this?

If it is an out-of-school risk:

  • How can the school support with this?
  • Is support required for families or learners?
  • Who can support with this: Community Learning and Development or Police Scotland?
Potential risks

Being more cyber resilient reduces the risk of internet safety issues arising. We all want the internet to be a more welcoming space for children and young people and that is why we promote this positive message of safe, smart and kind.

Topics to explore with learners might include:

  • the types of content they intend to view and how to judge if it is potentially inappropriate
  • the risks of unintentionally accessing and consuming inappropriate content and how to reduce the risk of this with cyber resilience
  • are the potential risks, and associated harms, the same for everyone – why are they different, and why does this matter?
App settings guides

YouTube and TikTok are the two most popular video content platforms for children and young people, while Instagram is the most popular social media platform to consume content, such as posts, images and videos.

These guides offer an overview of each app:

Instagram

TikTok

YouTube

Cyber resilience guidance

Devices

The first potential vulnerability when consuming online content is the device not being securely setup. Check with learners that they have:

  • a screenlock that requires a passcode or biometric (face or fingerprint) to log in to stop unauthorised access (hacking)
  • apple devices have a content filter, called communication safety in Messages, in their ‘screen time’ settings that blocks potentially nude content from children’s phones
Accounts

Being more cyber resilient reduces the risk of internet safety issues arising.

  • If they are accessing their information on social media, there are usually filter settings in the security and privacy settings for the platform – these can be used to reduce the content from certain sources, sites or profiles
  • Having a profile to view online content means that the platform can tailor suggested content for the user. Not using ana ccount will mean the platform suggets its most popular content, irrespective of who may be viewing it
  • YouTube https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/6342839?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform%3DAndroid
  • TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/safety/en/content-controls/ 
  • Instagram https://about.instagram.com/blog/tips-and-tricks/control-your-instagram-feed

there is the possibility that content creators may attempt to manipulate this process and label their content for an audience it may not be sutiable for. however, online platforms do work to reduce this risk.

Report and support

This is where knowledge of the platforms is useful for teachers. Each platform or provider will have its own reporting and settings systems. Having an idea of the platforms your learners are using allows you to better understand and support them with settings and reporting controls.

YouTube Report inappropriate videos, channels, and other content on YouTube – Android – YouTube Help (google.com)

TikTok Report a video | TikTok Help Center

Instagram How to report things | Instagram Help Centre

Resources and information

General and younger learners

This activity from Screen Scotland helps learners analyse and evaluate the purpose and content of videos, like they might do with a book in class: YouTube questions

This page from Internet Matters further explores and explains the potential issue of inappropriate content: What parents need to know about inappropriate content | Internet Matters

This video from BBC Own It explores the reasons that certain content may be suggested on platforms: Joe Tasker: why am I being suggested weird videos? – Own It – BBC

Older learners

Inappropriate content is subjective to the user and learners may feel that something is offensive or inappropriate because it seems unfair or untrue. There are several fact-checking websites and services, but these are a few reputable ones:

There is also a section on information literacy and tackling misinformation on this section of the site:

Information Literacy – critical thinking online

Gaming

Video gaming, consoles and platforms parental controls | Internet Matters

| Pegi Public Site

Online gaming | Digital Wings (uk.barclays)

Platform settings

Account & Security (playstation.com)

Manage Xbox online safety and privacy settings | Xbox Support

Security and your Apple ID – Apple Support (UK)

Consume – Gaming

Gaming is one of the most popular past times in the world. The amount of money spent playing games is more than that spent on video-on-demand (VOD), such as Netflix, or music streaming like Spotify combined. There are many aspects to gaming beyond playing the games, including livestreaming, esports or gambling.

Modern online gaming requires an account, with profiles, direct messages (DMs) and livestreams similar to the features on social media. 
Learners should be aware of the risks of inappropriate content in games, the pressure to make purchases (lootboxes, FUT, skins), and the risks associated with playing multiplayer online games whether friends or strangers.

This could be explored through Literacy and English LIT x-18a – Recognise the difference between fact and opinion and progressing to evaluative comments about relevance reliability and credibility with appropriate justification

The risks:

  • pressurised into purchases by targeted advertising, influencer promotions, or in-app/in-game microtransactions
  • inappropriate content – in games or livestreams
  • receiving unwanted DMs

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VCsEkj_dIg&w=560&h=315]

Becoming cyber resilient is the first step to being safer online. Talk to your learners about the devices and accounts that they use to access online information:

  • Ensure they have a secure login, such as password or 2-factor authentication
  • Have they set up account recovery details in case their account is hacked
  • Explore their gaming account profile – what is public and private? Are they aware of any risks or benefits?
  • Make them aware of any potential risks, such as clicking links in DMs that could lead to phishing or malware
  • If content is harmful or malicious in games, streams or DMs – do they know how to report it?

Being more cyber resilient reduces the risk of internet safety issues arising. We all want the internet to be a more welcoming space for children and young people and that is why we promote this positive message of safe, smart and kind.

With your learners:

  • Discuss the risk of playing inappropriate games or viewing streams
  • Ask them to explore and recommend smarter choices for more appropriate games – this could be class game reviews alongside book reviews
  • Look at how they can be kinder when playing cooperatively

Gaming Resources:

 

 

Gambling Resources

 

Information:

In the know – Games Guide

Account & Security UK (playstation.com)

Manage Xbox online safety and privacy settings | Xbox Support

Apple Arcade: Security and your Apple ID – Apple Support (UK)

Gaming consoles and platforms – Internet Matters

Gaming – Own It – BBC

Gaming – Childnet

Games Consoles | Safer Internet Centre

Home | Pegi Public Site

Staying-Safe-Online-advice-for-parents-and-carers.pdf (cyberscotland.com)

Home (askaboutgames.com)

NSPCC Esports Guide

Barclays Digital Wings – Gaming

Consume – Gambling

More and more of the money we spend is spent online or digitally and that includes gambling. Learners need to understand the benefits and risks of using digital money and online accounts to make purchases. Do they understand the amount of targeted advertising that they are exposed to? Are they aware of when a social media ‘influencer’ is being paid to promote products to them?

Online risks:

  • pressurised into spending by targeted advertising, influencer promotions, or in-app/in-game microtransactions – such as gambling offers and promotions on social media
  • not saving payment details on games consoles, devices or gambling apps can reduce the convenience of spending too much
  • cyber scams, such as phishing and ransomware, linked to gambling

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFrjzTUZNmU]

 

The Scottish Gambling Education Hub (@GamblingEduHub)

Fast Forward (@fastforwardorg)

Becoming cyber resilient is the first step to being safer online. Talk to your learners about the devices and accounts that they use to access online information:

  • Make them aware of any potential risks, such as clicking links in posts and on web pages – these could lead to phishing or malware
  • If they are accessing their information on social media, there are usually filter settings in the security and privacy settings for the platform – these can be used to reduce the content from certain sources, sites or profiles
  • If content is harmful or malicious do they know how to report it?

Being more cyber resilient reduces the risk of internet safety issues arising. We all want the internet to be a more welcoming space for children and young people and that is why we promote this positive message of safe, smart and kind.

With your learners:

  • Discuss with learners what gambling is and the risks it carries to wellbeing – an dhow to report a problem
  • Explore the safety features of online gambling – account settings, information literacy to better understand deals, offers and promotions
  • Investigate the need for support from friends and family to deal with gambling – would they report or support their friends or family?

Resources:

Resources | Fast Forward

Information:

What we do – Gambling Education Hub (fastforward.org.uk)

Gambling-Education-Toolkit-Gambling-An-Overview-March-19.pdf (fastforward.org.uk)

Your Recovery Toolkit – GamCare

Consume – the Cyber Resilience Internet Safety Teacher Toolkit

Our aim

This page aims to provide clear and concise information about popular platforms where children and young people consume online content. It is intended to provide knowledge and understanding for educators, so that they are more confident planning, delivering and assessing cyber resilience and internet safety learning.

How to use this page

Children and young people do not see the internet as a separate thing from ‘real life’ and it is important to understand the role of online devices and platforms in their lives. The internet is part of their cultural capital and key to engaging them with meaningful and relevant learning contexts.

  • Ask them about their online activities and behaviours – what do they consume?
  • Let them lead the learning – can they teach you something?
  • Engage with their ideas and answers – how can you use their knowledge and experiences to inform their learning?

Once you know what they consume online, you can use find ideas, information and resources on this page to support your planning.

cyber toolkit spending money online
cyber toolkit spending money online
cyber toolkit inappropriate content

Consume – Searching

More and more of the information we read is read online. Social media and web pages have replaced newspapers, and even TV, for many of us and our learners. 
Learners will likely use apps, such as TikTok or YouTube, to find information rather than a traditional web browser. However, web browsers and search engine apps, such as Google, will usually have more safety and security features to make searching more accurate and more accurate or reliable search results will help learners avoid ‘fake news’ or malicious/harmful content.

This could be explored through Literacy and English LIT x-18a – Recognise the difference between fact and opinion and progressing to evaluative comments about relevance reliability and credibility with appropriate justification

The risks:

  • Learners may follow in-app or social media links which may be targeted advertising or a ‘rabbit hole’ of misinformation
  • Without appropriate search settings, learners may find inappropriate or harmful content
  • Learners are probably unaware that the first results returned in a web search are usually adverts linked to shopping sites, and feel pressured into making a purchase

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VCsEkj_dIg]

Becoming cyber resilient is the first step to being safer online. Talk to your learners about the devices and accounts that they use to access online information:

  • Make them aware of any potential risks, such as unreliable webpages or targeted advertising
  • Explain the advantages of using a web browser to find information over social media apps – a search engine, such as Google, will allow users to use filter settings that reduce the risk
  • If search results are harmful or malicious do they know how to report it?

Being more cyber resilient reduces the risk of internet safety issues arising. We all want the internet to be a more welcoming space for children and young people and that is why we promote this positive message of safe, smart and kind.

With your learners:

  • Make them aware of the dangers of clicking the first results returned or searching without filters, like SafeSearch, enabled
  • Teach them how to use settings, advanced search or keyword parameters to increase the relevance of search results
  • Discuss how to understand, analyse and evaluate search results. You may already be doing this with physical texts, such as books, but it is important to make the learning contextual.

Resources for more effective searching and finding:

Free Search Better Tutorial at GCFGlobal

Information:

Filter explicit results using SafeSearch – Computer – Google Search Help

 

Top tips for seeing something scary or upsetting online – Own It – BBC

Upsetting, anxious, worried, inappropriate, social media – Own It – BBC

 

 

Communicate – the Cyber Resilience Internet Safety Teacher Toolkit

Our aim

This page aims to provide clear and concise information about popular platforms where children and young people communicate online. It is intended to provide knowledge and understanding for educators, so that they are more confident planning, delivering and assessing cyber resilience and internet safety learning.

How to use this page

Children and young people do not see the internet as a separate thing from ‘real life’ and it is important to understand the role of online devices and platforms in their lives. The internet is part of their cultural capital and key to engaging them with meaningful and relevant learning contexts.

  • Ask them about their online activities and behaviours – what do they consume?
  • Let them lead the learning – can they teach you something?
  • Engage with their ideas and answers – how can you use their knowledge and experiences to inform their learning?

Once you know how they communicate online, you can use find ideas, information and resources on this page to support your planning.

Platforms

Esports Parents and Carers Guide with NSPCC and British Esports Association

The British Esports Association (@British_Esports) has developed a new Parent & Carers Guide in collaboration with the NSPCC, which aims to educate parents and carers about esports and online safety.

This guide has been created to provide information to help parents understand more about the esports industry.

The contents of the guide include:

  • Information about the British Esports Student Champs
  • Benefits of esports
  • Esports in education
  • Academic pathways
  • Inclusivity and diversity in esports
  • How you can get involved with your child
  • Parents testimonials
  • Online safety

 

Tom Dore, Head of Education at British Esports Association, said:

“At British Esports we’re helping to establish industry standards for safeguarding and keeping young people safe online. Developing the Parent & Carers guide in collaboration with NSPCC has allowed us to celebrate many of the positives around esports, and also highlight important issues around safeguarding and online safety.

It is crucial as an industry that we’re doing everything we can to keep young people safe while participating in esports. We should look to traditional sport, and other established industries, to learn from their ongoing work. British Esports strongly encourages all stakeholders in the esports industry to scrutinise their own practise around their work with young people and prioritise safeguarding and online safety throughout their organisations.’

 

Find out more about the guide

 

View the guide

Cyber Resilience and Internet Safety for Early Learning and Childcare

Why is cyber resilience and internet safety (CRIS) so important?

We are spending an increasing amount of time learning, playing and socialising in online environments. In fact, 87% of people aged 16+ in the UK used the internet in 2019 (Ofcom). Our online behaviours fall into three categories, we:

  • consume
  • create
  • communicate

To support our children and young people navigate this part of their lives, we need to be able to support them to recognise, react to, and recover from online harms. At the same time, we need to promote safer, smarted and kinder ways of playing, learning and socialising online.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iOiytAUrpQ]

Embedding the experience & outcome ​through a practical play-based approach

This session recording aims is to support and equip you with the knowledge and confidence to embed cyber resilience and internet safety at early level through a practical play-based approach. This session will explain where Cyber Resilience and Internet Safety sits within the Technologies curriculum and where it overlaps with the Health and Wellbeing, Numeracy and Maths and Literacy and English curriculum, and why it is so important to embed across your curriculum. We will unpick the CRIS experience and outcome and explore what this means in the context of play and how it can be part of everyday conversations, and what this might look like in your own settings.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi2a42jkxoE]

Resources for Supporting CRIS in ELCs

All childcare providers want to create a safe and secure environment for the children in your care. As we become ever more reliant on digital technology it is increasingly important that you protect data (on children, staff and families), finances and also the integrity of any digital systems you use, including email, communication channels and databases.

There are a handful of steps you can take to minimise the potentially costly and disruptive effect of a cyber incident, and better safeguard the children in your care, as well as your business’s finances and reputation. This short seminar is for anyone working in childcare in Scotland. It is run by the National Cyber Security Centre (www.ncsc.gov.uk), and supported by the Scottish Government, Education Scotland and Care Inspectorate, as part of CyberScotland Week. It will provide you with advice and steps you can take to minimise the likelihood and impact of a cyber attack on your setting, and information about where to get help and advice if you need it.

Please click here to download e-pamphlet PDF Early Years practitioners: using cyber security to protect your settings. 

 

 

Keeping-Under-Fives-Safe-Online2.pdf (childnet.com)

Upcoming CRIS webinars

cyber sprinters game

CyberSprinters – Cyber Security Game, Launched by the NCSC

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) is the UK agency responsible for identifying cyber risks and attacks, combatting cyber crime and providing guidance and information to the public. They recently launched a brand new game to teach children aged 7 to 11 how to stay secure online.

read more here

play the game

 

Let us know how you have used it, or any of our CRIS resources, by sharing your story here Please fill out this form