Online Safety

Click the link below to a vital resource to help you guide your child to use the internet and social networking safely. 

https://www.internetmatters.org/resources/what-age-can-my-child-start-social-networking/

All apps that allow social interaction have the potential for abuse. There is a minimum age requirement in the sign-up agreements, and it is important that parents are aware of this, as it indicates the level of protections offered. You will see below that they all start at secondary school age. Typically, if the minimum age is 18, there are no protections offered by the service to prevent inappropriate communication, and no parental controls. Apps with a minimum age of 13 generally have some way of reporting and or blocking inappropriate content along with some parental controls.

All apps have a PEGI rating. This is equivalent to the age rating of a film, set at 12, 16, and 18. It is illegal to sell rated items to children below the age rating in the UK.

Snapchat has recently added location sharing to the app. This gives pinpoint locations of users when switched on, with obvious implications for safety. We strongly recommend that parents and students take the time to look at how their location is shared in Snapchat and other apps (e.g. Facebook).

Please see this blogpost for more details about controlling who can see your location settings in snapchat.

http://www.childnet.com/blog/introducing-snap-maps-the-new-location-sharing-feature-in-snapchat?utm_content=buffere2c35&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

We are aware that there are groups of people using social media groups to encourage dangerous behaviour in children (sometimes described as ‘Blue Whale’).

ThinkUKnow have created a page to support parents and young people online. The site includes home activity packs with simple 15-minute activities support children's understanding of online safety at a time.

There is also parent support information for primary and secondary age groups.

The resources can be found here: https://www.thinkuknow.co.uk/parents/Support-tools/home-activity-worksheets