Online friendship or abuse? Innocent questions or attempted grooming?
A self-help test at sos.drossinternets.lv helps to recognize grooming on the internet. Children and young people, as well as parents and educators are invited to fill out the self-help test developed by experts from the Latvian Safer Internet Centre, the State Police and State Inspectorate for the Protection of Children's rights to test how safe the online friendship is, to learn how to recognize grooming cases and where to seek for a help.

Tool available in English at en.sos.drossinternets.lv

A tool in the form of an online test to recognize grooming, prevent children from being groomed and encouraging to seek for a help.
The test is intended for:
1)    children, so that they can test their online friendship, especially if the child has never met the person face-to-face and is not sure if the person can be trusted.
2)    Specialists working with children and parents or the child's legal representatives. If your child has made an online friendship and you suspect that this friendship could harm your child, you can use the test to see if your child has experienced online grooming. A parent or a child's legal representative may find out that someone is inviting their child to engage in sexual activity online. This can cause the child to feel confused and uncomfortable, and the child may feel fear, guilt or shame. The test will help in such cases, so that the parent and the child can find out what happened and find out the circumstances, as well as receive instructions on the next steps.

The test consists of 12 to 20 questions depending on the age group. And questions are related to violations of criminal law against children. For instance:
•    Did your "friend" send you something that made you feel fearful, ashamed, confused?
•    Did your "friend" talk to you about intimate body parts?
•    Did your "friend" try to persuade you or force you to take a photo or film yourself naked?
•    Did your friend send you a photo, video, or link where you can see a naked adult or parts of his or her intimate body?
•    Did your "friend" ask you to keep your communication as a secret?

After answering to all the questions results are shown with advises what to do and where to get support if the answers indicate that the child may have suffered from grooming.

Supplementing materials:
1)    a poster with advises for children in which situations to be careful when making friends online
2)    brochure for parents – how to talk with children to prevent grooming and what to do if adult suspects that a child has already become a victim of grooming.