Better Internet for Kids

Media Literacy Weeks is an annual event organised by the One World in Schools department (JSNS) of People in Need; JSNS is part of the Safer Internet Centre in the Czech Republic. The aim of this event is to develop media literacy and strengthen the critical thinking skills of primary and secondary school pupils and students across the Czech Republic.

Since 2012, the United Nations International Day of the Girl has been celebrated on 11 October. The child rights organisation and Plan International co-initiated this day and set a focus topic every year with the Girls' Report. In 2023, the topic will be "Her Body, Her Choice", focusing on girls' physical and mental health concerning sexuality and reproduction. On World Girls' Day, klicksafe asks: What about girls' sexual self-determination on the internet?

It’s September once again, which means it’s time for pupils to go back to school. Better Internet for Kids (BIK) wants to kick off the new school year with a campaign aimed at anyone working with children and young people to educate them to a safer, better internet experience, including teachers and educators, to support their activities and raise awareness of online safety topics in the classroom.

There is a category on the popular streaming platform Twitch that is dedicated to hot tubs, usually featuring women in bathing suits or bikinis, receiving money in exchange for displaying their bodies during the stream. Following a similar dynamic, influencers and content creators can earn money by producing erotic and pornographic content on OnlyFans, a platform where subscribers can access exclusive, often inappropriate content after purchasing a subscription. Do these options pose a danger for children and young people?

The European partners of the European SafeOnline (ESOI) project launched the SafeOnline Prototype: a ready-to-use toolbox for European organisations that want to support parents to improve their children's online safety.

On 31 October 2023, ECPAT Taiwan hosted the ECPAT International Conference on child safety. Our BIK Youth Ambassador, Kathrin Morasch, a longtime advocate for online safety for children and youth, provides us with her insights regarding the conference and reflects on her involvement as a keynote speaker, sharing the perspective of the BIK+ strategy, youth participation and the European Union's rules protecting minors.

For the 2023 edition of Safer Internet Day, the Safer Internet Centre in Iceland (SAFT) focused on collaboration. SAFT is a part of a new network about media literacy in Iceland with more than 40 other partners, including the Icelandic media commission and the national broadcasting company.

Exactly one year ago, on 11 May 2022, the European Commission adopted a new European strategy for a Better Internet for Kids (BIK+), to improve age-appropriate digital services and to ensure that every child is protected, empowered and respected online. Let’s take a look at further policy developments that have happened over the course of the past year.

October marked European Cybersecurity Month (ECSM), an annual awareness-raising campaign across the European Union that includes hundreds of activities and events such as workshops and conferences. The campaign, organised by the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA) and the European Commission, in which the National Cybersecurity Centre (CNCS) and Portuguese Safer Internet Centre (PTSIC) were involved, has the motto for 2023: #BeSmarterThanAHacker.

Today, another edition of the bi-annual Insafe Training meeting kicks off. The event is an opportunity for the Insafe network of European Safer Internet Centres (SICs) to meet to facilitate the sharing of experience and good practices between network countries, to explore areas of common ground, and opportunities for closer working between awareness raising, helpline, and youth participation strands. The October 2023 Insafe Training meeting is held online, and includes three mornings of sessions on exploring the opportunities and challenges posed by Artificial Intelligence (AI).