E-safety issues for schools and local authorities Ruth Hammond

E-safety issues for schools
and local authorities
Ruth Hammond
Key messages for today
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Young people and ICT
Relevant policies and legislation
Issues and risks
Role of the school/organisation
Support available
What do you need to do?
For young people ICT is not a novelty but the way
they engage with their world - 21st century culture
• Communication via email, chat rooms and message boards, IM,
SMS, weblogs, social networks, Skype, podcasting……..
• Entertainment – watching films on DVD, downloading music,
playing games, taking, storage and retrieval of digital images.
• Education – research, word processing, data manipulation,
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modelling, design, creativity, recording thoughts
Personal management – diary, appointment calendars and
address books, alarm clock and personal reminders, finding the best
party locations!
• For shopping
• ………………..all at the same time!
Why should I be concerned about e-safety?
• Every Child Matters: Change for children
– Be healthy
– Stay safe
– Enjoy and achieve
– Make a positive contribution
– Achieve economic well-being
• Safeguarding Children in Education – Sept 2004
• Working Together to Safeguard Children (11.58-11.62)
• Practitioners need to know that ICT is safe if they are to
take advantage of its benefits
• Schools have a duty of care - both inside and outside
• DfES – ‘Harnessing Technology’ – the e-strategy
What are the risks?
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Content -sexual, racist, violent unreliable/bigoted ie safety of children’s minds
Commerce - scams, phishing and pharming, bluejacking, downloads which
steal information– children’s and parents!
Contact - via interactive technologies – IM, chat, multiplayer games
Culture – bullying, camera phones, blogging, moblogging, social networking …..
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The ‘C’ of ICT is the most dangerous
ie Communication which can lead to Contact
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Approx 40 - 50 cases in the last 4 -5 years compared to 500 serious
road casualties per year!
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The biggest Internet danger is that we concentrate on the dangers and
forget the benefits!
Balance and perspective
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http://www.children-go-online.net/
‘..the risks do not merit a moral panic, and
nor do they warrant seriously restricting
children’s internet use because this would
deny them the many benefits of the
internet. Indeed, there are real costs to
lacking internet access or sufficient skills
to use it.’
‘However, the risks are nonetheless
widespread, they are experienced by
many children as worrying or
problematic, and they do warrant
serious intervention by government,
educators, industry and parents.’
Schools should be raising awareness of:
• Internet safety
– keeping personal information secret across all technologies – email, chat,
IM, mobile
– bullying across all technologies including camera phones & blogs
– people online may not be who they say they are
• Internet security
– spotting copycats websites and scams
– viruses and spam via email
– if it looks to good to be true it generally is
• Media literacy
– evaluating reliability/validity of information
– copyright and plagiarism
– P2P networks - allow anyone to publish videos and large files to anyone
who needs them eg Napster and Gnutella, music and porn!
Issues for schools to consider
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Who is responsible for teaching e-safety?
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In primary phase?
In secondary phase?
Whole school issue of child safety not ICT!
Technological issues
At what age should internet safety lessons start?
How can parents be involved?
What support is there in schools for teachers in the event of a
‘disclosure’?
Advent of 3G and ‘mobile internet’
Protection for staff – AUP
Damage to network through downloading of files/viruses
Data security
Identifiable/contactable/pupil email addresses/images on web sites
Accessing inappropriate web content at school
External issues being brought into school – eg cyberbullying
Key measures
Policy and procedure - what help is available?
Becta’s Schools website http://www.becta.org.uk/schools/esafety
•E-safety publication:
Main recommendations:
•E-safety co-ordinator
•Policy and management team
•Checklists of AUPs
•Incident log
•Safetynet discussion forum
Infrastructure - what help is available?
• ISP Safety site
http://ispsafety.ngfl.gov.uk
• Becta Accreditation of Internet Services to Education:
enables schools to purchase services from accredited suppliers that
meet and maintain specific standards in content filtering and service
performance.
• Delivering the National Digital Infrastructure
– Robust and reliable networks
– Secure and safe access to data and content via the National
Education Network
– Best value purchasing
– Technical support and services
– Finding choosing and using resources
– Personalised learning spaces
Educational resources - what help is available?
www.becta.org.uk/publications
Primary:
• The Internet Proficiency scheme for
KS2
• Smartsurfers for KS2
• Others….
Secondary:
• Signposts to Safety for KS3/4
• Childnet International ‘Know IT All’ for KS3
• Think U Know
• Others….
Parents:
• Parentscentre
• KnowITAll for Parents
What should schools/organisations be doing?
•Be alert to the possibilities!
•Provide:
- Policies and procedures
- Infrastructure
- Education for staff, parents, students
- Standards and inspection
(School Evaluation Framework
4b. To what extent do learners feel safe and adopt safe
practices?
5c. How well are learners guided and supported?)
E-safety: the experience in English Educational Establishments
Autumn term 2005, random anonymous sample
444 schools and colleges
(303 primary, 123 secondary, Special schools, PRU’s, colleges)
In depth interviews with 61 teachers
25 Local Education Authorities
5 Regional Broadband Consortia
Key findings
LEAs are often the first port of call for e-safety advice – particularly in primary education
Having a designated e-safety co-ordinated and AUP makes a difference
Most common breech of e-safety is the viewing of unsuitable content
Teaching about e-safety makes a difference
http://www.becta.org.uk/research/reports/esafetyaudit
Ruth Hammond
British Educational Communications and
Technology Agency (Becta)
Millburn Hill Road
Science Park
Coventry
CV4 7JJ
• Tel: 02476 416994
• Fax: 02476 411418
• www.becta.org.uk
• ruth.hammond@becta.org.uk
Stay Safe:
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From maltreatment, neglect, violence and sexual exploitation
From accidental injury and death
From bullying and discrimination
From crime and anti-social behaviour in and out of school
Have security, stability and are cared for
These aims were written with the ‘real’ world in mind, however
many equally apply to the ‘virtual’ world of 21st century
DfES – ‘Harnessing Technology’ – the e-strategy
‘One of our key aims is to personalise learning for children and
adults, and their interaction with professionals.’
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home-school links
Anytime anywhere learning
Authentication
Lifelong!
Learner centric
addressing children and learning services as a whole, rather
than sector-by-sector
• Safeguarding children across all services in line with
Every Child Matters agenda
Concerns are shifting from what children are ‘downloading’ in
terms of content to what they are ‘uploading’ to the net.
..no-one is safe!
What help is available for the Primary phase?
Education and training
• The Internet Proficiency scheme
for KS2 (UK)
• Netsmartz (US)
• Disney (US)
• Faux Paw (US)
• Internet Superheroes (US)
• Smart Surfers (UK)
• CBBC – Stay Safe (UK)
• Hector Protector (NZ)
What help is available for the Secondary phase?
Education and training
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Signposts to Safety for KS3/4
Know It All
Chalk Face resource
Websafe Crackerz
Thinkuknow.co.uk
Netsmartz (US)
http://www.smartsurfers.co.uk/
Know It All
http://www.childnet-int.org/kia/
http://www.websafecrackerz.com/
Parentscentre
http://www.parentscentre.gov.uk/usingcomputersandtheinternet/
http://www.ikeepsafe.org
http://disney.go.com/surfswell
www.netsmartz.org
Cybercafe Interactive web site
Web site - standalone and a teaching resource.
•Hosted on Gridclub
• http://www.gridclub.com/cybercafe/teachers
Gridclub Cybercafe
teachers page
•Presentation for parents
and governors
•Screensaver
•Teacher’s pack
•http://www.gridclub.com/cybercafe/teachers
Reliability and bias?
http://zapatopi.net/treeoctopus/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/help/safesurfing/
Hector Protector
http://www.microsoft.com/nz/athome/security/children/hector.mspx
Hector floats on the screen and covers it if
children see something which makes them
feel uncomfortable