CNS interviewed by Red Dragon following social networking concerns

Ofcom concerns about social networking sites

04 April, 2008

Today CNS was asked to comment by Red Dragon on the new released Ofcom report detailing the impact of social networks on people's lives in the UK as part of a wider media literacy campaign and surveyed 5,000 adults and more than 3,000 children.

Its statistics suggest that around 19% of all UK youngsters have a presence on a social networking site.

"Social networks are clearly a very important part of people's lives and are having an impact on how people live their lives," said James Thickett, director of market research at Ofcom.

The three leading social networks, MySpace, Bebo and Facebook, all say they remove profiles of users that are found to be too young on their sites.

But at present no technology is used to actively verify the age of users.

The Home Office guidelines are set to encourage social networking sites to investigate age verification technologies and to give better signposting to users about privacy settings, and warnings about the implications of posting personal details.

In an update, Sex offenders' e-mail addresses are now to be passed to social networking sites like Facebook and Bebo to prevent them contacting children.

Under government proposals, offenders who do not give police their address - or give a false one - would face up to five years in jail.

Websites would be expected to monitor the e-mail address usage or block them accessing the sites.

The Home Office said the new laws would apply to about 30,000 sex offenders.

Other measures in the new government guidelines include a "kitemark" for filtering software.

Social networking sites will also link to organisations such as the Child Exploitation Online Protection Agency (CEOP), children's charity the NSPCC and the Samaritans so users can easily get help or report potential problems.

Some recommedations to protect your children are detailed below: 

1. Check official guidelines
http://www.ico.gov.uk/Youth/section2/intro.aspx

http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/

http://police.homeoffice.gov.uk/operational-policing/crime-disorder/child-protection-taskforce

2. Ask advice from your Internet Service Provider. They usually provide software to block website access. This would only apply, however, to access from your home computer.

3. Check your childs mobile phone.
Some mobile phones now have the facility to give internet access and some schools give internet access to their pupils, therefore, actively check your child's account. This would require some degree of co-operation between both parties and the sharing of the child's password. This may sound extreme but at least there is some agreement between both parties and the child knows you are monitoring the situation without completely banning the use of the social network providing they are in the age range to use it.

Things to check with your child's profile:
Profile page is set to Private.
Profile page does not include address and mobile number.
Age details are correct.
Any images are appropriate or remove images completely.
It is also a good idea to check:
Thread of conversations with and assess if they are appropriate.

Further information can also be found on the Get Safe online site or please contact us directly.