If only it were that easy. For me as a parent, my approach is to implement a "Great personal firewall" - that is, internet restrictions that decrease over time as they mature, and starting with essentially zero access. Unfortunately, it's probably doomed to fail as other kids their age (5 + 7) and in their peer groups are already walking around with smartphones.
To put it bluntly, too many parents are too unenaged and lazy (or self-centered).
Now it's just outright forbidden to have anything with a chat. And no Internet.
The problem is that other 10 year old have mobiles, free PC access, etc, so there constant peer pressure.
At home measures are at best a delay, not a fix. What you also have to do is actually communicate with your child. If you're strict about what they can and cannot do on the internet, they will feel shame for doing it anyway, which may also mean they would be too ashamed to talk to their parents if for example they are getting groomed online.
Kids go to school, have lessons, right ? And few minutes breaks between lessons ? How that parents want to censorship what kids talk about ? Not to mention phones use. And why exactly ?
Thing is as it always is: parents make fundamens in culture/world view eg via their views and religion they subscribe. And then society and reality takes over. What society you have ?
I tried setting up parental controls on Fortnite and it was a nightmare, having threats multiple accounts with multiple providers, it felt very much designed to force people to go “ahh forget it”.
They do; in the UK, if you want to have access to porn, you need to tell your ISP and they will unblock it.
Of course, that's a game of whack-a-mole because you can render porn in Minecraft servers or join one of many communities on Whatsapp or Discord if needs be. It mainly blocks the well-known bigger porn sites.
The conclusion is, it's a service problem, not a howto-block problem
kid-friendly content is under supplied and often bad maintained.
To quote GabeN: Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem
But it's not forbidden or hidden away, so kids aren't curious about it.
Yes, but the problem is, many (if not most) of those content or services were created by adults and dispised by kids.
My oldest girl is 5. She's already very aware that other kids in her class have access to tablets and phones. How on earth do I responsibly explain to her the dangers? I have enough trouble asking her to get dressed and keep her nappy dry at night.
I say "I consider", because skills self-evidently essential to a good life (emotional regulation, focus and attention span, ability to read other people's emotional states, effective communication, physical skills) are increasingly not generally considered that way.
1. Educate children about bad actors and scams. (We already do this in off-line contexts.)
2. Use available tools to limit exposure. Without this children will run into such content even when not seeking it. As demonstrated with Tiktok seemingly sending new accounts to sexualised content,(1) and Google/Meta's pathetic ad controls.
3. Be firm about when is the right age to have their own phone. There is zero possibility that they'll be able to have one secretly without a responsible parent discovering it.
4. Schools should not permit phone use during school time (enforced in numerous regions already.)
5. If governments have particular issues with websites, they can use their existing powers to block or limit access. While this is "whack-a-mole", the idea of asking each offshore offending website to comply is also "whack-a-mole" and a longer path to the intended goal.
6. Don't make the EU's "cookies" mistake. E.g. If the goal is to block tracking, then outlaw tracking, do not enact proxy rules that serve only as creative challenges to keep the status quo.
and the big one:
7. Parents must accept that their children will be exposed at some level, and need to be actively involved in the lives of their children so they can answer questions. This also means parenting in a way that doesn't condemn the child needlessly - condemnation is a sure strategy to ensure that the child won't approach their parents for help or with their questions.
Also some tips:
1. Set an example on appropriate use of social media. Doom scrolling on Tiktok and instagram in front of children is setting a bad example. Some housekeeping on personal behaviours will have a run on effect.
2. If they have social media accounts the algorithm is at some point going to recommend them to you. Be vigilant, but also handle the situation appropriately, jumping to condemnation just makes the child better at hiding their activity.
3. Don't post photos of your children online. It's not just an invasion of their privacy, but pedophile groups are known to collect, categorise and share even seemingly benign photos.
1. https://globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/digital-threats/tikto...
i know, freedom of speech, it's your money and not mine, etc.
how does this relate to what i said? i get the "we're a free platform where everyone can do everything and no one is responsible for anything", just a cheap excuse from my POV considering the unhinged, doxxy culture on there. sure, there are cute boards, nice. i am talking about the inhumane, unhinged slurry of shit.
"Sure my neighbour has a couple of cadavres in his cellar, but have you seen the pretty flowers on his balcony?"
but per usual you can't criticize 4chan in the slightest without its warriors appearing to defend it. i get it. 4chan did and does cool stuff. it also does absolutely disgusting things, surprisingly this always gets dismissed as 'it's only the couple of rogue boards which are crazy'.
That would seem to be least intrusive option.
Using the internet in the UK/EU is such a horrible experience, every cookie pop-up is a reminder how badly thought out these rules are.
Also remember that the pop-up is an industry choice, the rules only mandate that a user should opt in, not how. No laws mandate the cookie banners, no regulations say they should be obnoxious.
What's to stop that same kid to buy a porno dvd? Or to download a torrent of a porno? Or a porn magazine?
There's no need, that's already the case.
All phones (the network account attached to the SIM actually, not the phone itself) comes with a content filter enabled by default in the UK, adult or not.
All the routers also come with filtering settings as well and ISPs ship with the filtering on by default, since that is the law and has been for several decades.
This policy was pushed by David Cameron, who was the prime minister at the time:
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/the-internet-and-porn...
White listing worked for a while (months) when they were young, but it was super-high touch and stuff just broke all the time. You try to whitelist a site, but you have to then figure out all their CDNs.
Restricting specific sites works, sort of, until they find some place that hosts that content. Blocking youtube doesn't work(*), every search engine has a watch videos feature. (Why are you spending 3 hours a day on DDG?) There's really no way to segment youtube into "videos they need to watch for school" and "viral x hour minecraft playthrough". Somehow, we've managed to combine the biggest time waste ever with a somewhat useful for education hosting service.
That's leaving out the jailbreaks that come from finding an app's unfiltered webview and getting an open web escape there.
There's basically no reliable method for filtering even on locked down platforms.
* there's probably a way to kill it at the firewall based on dns, but that's iffy for phones and it's network wide.
Technical cookies don't require any consent so every time you see a cookie banner the website owner wants to gather more data about you than necessary. Furthermore, these rules don't require cookie banners, it's what the industry has chosen as the way to get consent to track their users.
When purchasing an internet-enabled device the UK could regulate that large retailers must ask if the device is to be used by an under 18 year old. If they say yes, then they could ship with filters enabled. They could also regulate that all internet-enabled devices which could be sold to children should support child filters.
If we did this then whether or not a child views NSFW material it will be on the parent, instead of the current situation where whether a child can view NSFW material online depends on the age verification techniques of Chinese companies like TikTok or American companies like 4chan.
All mobile network connections already come with content filters enabled in the UK, adult or not, and has to be explicitly disabled.
Like you can configure your browser to do whatever you want with cookies - blocking them all, blocking only third party ones, etc. - there is no need for government regulation here.
But the legislators are completely tech illiterate and even the general public supports more interference and regulation.
I don't see anything wrong here: Sure, Ofcom can have the legal authority to regulate online safety worldwide. It's just that this... legal authority... isn't quite enforceable outside the UK jurisdiction. How unfortunate!
> What should I do if there is confidential information in my response?
> You must provide all the information requested, even if you consider that the information, or any part of it, is confidential (for example, because of its commercial sensitivity).
> If you consider that any of the information you are required to provide is confidential, you should clearly identify the relevant information and explain in writing your reasons for considering it confidential (for example, the reasons why you consider disclosure of the information will seriously and prejudicially affect the interests of your business, a third party or the private affairs of an individual. You may find it helpful to do this in a separate document marked ‘confidential information’
> Ofcom will take into account any claims that information should be considered confidential. However, it is for Ofcom to decide what is or is not confidential, taking into account any relevant common law and statutory definitions. We do not accept unjustified or unsubstantiated claims of confidentiality. Blanket claims of confidentiality covering entire documents or types of information are also unhelpful and will rarely be accepted. For example, we would expect stakeholders to consider whether the fact of the document’s existence or particular elements of the document (e.g. its title or metadata such as to/from/date/subject or other specific content) are not confidential. You should therefore identify specific words, numbers, phrases or pieces of information you consider to be confidential. You may also find it helpful to categorise your explanations as Category A, Category B etc
> Any confidential information provided to Ofcom is subject to restrictions on its further disclosure under the common law of confidence. In many cases, information provided to Ofcom is also subject to statutory restrictions relating to the disclosure of that information (regardless of whether that information is confidential information). For this reason, we do not generally consider it necessary to sign non-disclosure agreements. Our general approach to the disclosure of information is set out below.
> For the avoidance of doubt, you are not required to provide information that is legally privileged and you can redact specific parts of documents that are legally privileged. However, where you withhold information on the basis that it is privileged you should provide Ofcom with a summary of the nature of the information and an explanation of why you consider it to be privileged. Please note that just because an email is sent to or from a legal adviser does not mean it is necessarily a legally privileged communication. Further information is available in paragraph 3.18 of our Online Safety Information Powers Guidance.
So ofcom's position is:
We want your data, you will give us your data, the GDPR does not apply to you, and if it does, we will decide whether it does. You must explain yourself to us. You must not redact anything. Even if you think you can redact anything (you know, because GDPR) you cannot redact anything. The GDPR and data protection laws do not apply because we have said so. You are required to break confidentiality agreements. We will not sign an NDA because we do not need to and we will not justify ourselves to you in any way shape or form.
We are the UK, and therefore, because we asked you to, you will comply with our every demand, whim and whimper. Otherwise we will continue to send strongly worded emails.
And fine you. And block you. Because that's the only thing we can do. And you best not advertise VPN's or we'll...Send another sternly worded email!
Good job UK!
(I cannot see how that paragraph is in any way legal, it must break the EU/UK's data protection laws in trying to compel disclosure of third party data. I cannot see any court in the UK ever upholding that paragraph if legally challenged as it's way above Ofcom's remit to be demanding confidential data. In any case, they should absolutely be required to sign NDA's)
This generalises very well for all Government. Shame we're a couple of generations into education being about producing pliant workers over independent, thinking human beings.
ridruejo•1h ago
cdfsdsadsa•43m ago
Edit: In a nutshell - almost every other transfer of goods and services across national borders is subject to quality standards. Why do we give a pass to a system that allows deep, individualised access to people's personal lives and mental processes?
probably_wrong•16m ago
I don't want the government to decide which thoughts I can access and which ones I can't, but I also understand that allowing a foreign power (let's say Russia, although "the US" works just as fine) to freely run undercover propaganda and/or destabilization campaigns without any recourse doesn't look good either. And while I agree with "when in doubt aim for the option with more freedom", I can understand those who share your position.
willtemperley•11m ago