How To Keep Your Children Safe Online – NCC Gives Safety Tips (1)

The impact of COVID-19 pandemic has brought to bear a shift in the norms, putting more activities, including education of children, online. This has leapfrogged Nigerian children into the future.

Online activities have therefore acquired a new meaning and become the reality of Nigerian parents and children.

As screen time and screen activities are rapidly becoming the new normal while keeping parents constantly searching for online learning platforms for their wards, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has alerted parents on the overwhelming and scary possibility of their children being hurt by faceless individuals while surfing the internet.

To this end, the commission has taken special effort to educate all parents and caregivers as well as gives tips on how to keep their children and wards safe online.

 NCC’s Safety Tips

Stay Informed: It is important, according to the commission that a parent should stay informed and be educated about the use of your devices and the devices your child has access to.

“Stay informed on various social network sites and what happens on them. Stay informed and better educated than your children and wards.” NCC highlighted.

Anticipate Risks: NCC also noted that to keep children safe online, parents need to anticipate risks.

The anticipation of risks will lead to appropriate control measures being put in place before a child is allowed access to digital devices or the internet, NCC teaches.

Care Givers should be trained on how to guide children in online activities: Schools have adopted the use of online platforms for education. Therefore, care must be taken to educate the teachers and prepare them for the avalanche of questions from children, on the use of various online applications or whatever information the children encounter online.

Install child appropriate apps/search engines: Before a device is given to a child, age appropriate applications should first be installed on it. This will protect the child from inadvertently stumbling into wrong sites that appear as pop-ups.

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Install a firewall: NCC disclosed that firewalls act as content filters. In order to make sure non-age appropriate content does not appear on the child’s device, the commission advised parents to install firewalls.

Set timers on all devices used by the child: This helps to create discipline and structure for the child. Ensure clear time boundaries are set.

Empower the child: According to the commission, this is one of the most important steps any parent can take.

NCC highlighted that there is a sense of privacy associated with being online.
As parents will not always be there when children go online, adopting a child-centric approach to the use of the internet prepares the child for unforeseen issues and assures the child of the trust and respect of his/her parent.

“Children will enjoy the benefits and advantages of the internet when they know how to stay in control and not allow themselves to be victims of the platforms and devices.

“Therefore it is important to set ground rules and instructions in collaboration with the child.

“Teach children basic online safety skills and how to apply them,” NCC said.

Pay attention/be observant: As children spend more time online, NCC advised parents and caregivers to observe behavioral patterns and changes.

“Recognize unusual activities, actions, and reactions. Where any change is observed, calmly address those changes and allow the child sufficient room to talk without being judgmental.

“The home is a safety net for children. It is also the best support system that allows an abused child to recover from abuse and provides a means for managing post abuse trauma. Children need to know they can go to their parents with whatever concerns they encounter online.” NCC addressed.