New campaign uses cartoons to warn youngsters of online dangers

A new government-backed safety campaign is being launched, aimed at teaching children as young as five about the potential dangers of making friends online.

With kids as young as six and seven using social networking sites and even web-cams, child protection groups strongly believe that education of even the very young is necessary to keep them safe online. The campaign, which launches as part of EU Internet Safety Day, uses cartoons to communicate to children that people they meet online may not be all they seem.

Organisations such as the UK Council for Child Internet Safety and the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, which are behind the campaign, believe that by starting at an early age and raising awareness of the possible risks, more children can be kept safe online. As many as 80 per cent of the five to seven year old age group are reckoned to be internet users, and children at that age may not yet have acquired sufficient skills to differentiate between online friendships and something more sinister.

However critics observe that there can be no substitute for parental controls, and that teaching children about the internet at home, as well as supervised access is the best way to keep kids safe.

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