SAFETY ON AND OFF LINE
Whether you lack confidence online or have responsibility for the online safety of a young person, protecting yourself and others digitally can be confusing and difficult. We provide basic e-safety guidance with every course we deliver and our policy is detailed below. We also recommend the following websites as a useful source of information.
SAFETY ON AND OFF LINE
CEOP – The child exploitation and online protection centre from the police. Working across geographical borders and harnessing the best from all sectors is crucial to the protection of children. The CEOP International Child Protection Network does just that. Find out more and see if your organisation could work with us.
IWF – Internet Watch Foundation, the UK Hotline for reporting criminal online content
Child sexual abuse content hosted anywhere in the world
Criminally obscene adult content hosted in the UK
Non-photographic child sexual abuse images hosted in the UK
Reports are confidential and can be made anonymously
EU Kids online – a multinational research network. It seeks to enhance knowledge of European children’s online opportunities, risks and safety. It uses multiple methods to map children’s and parents’ experience of the internet
Generally speaking your safety online is affected more by what you do than the computer you use. If you feel that you really lack confidence the best approach may be to search for courses we offer in IT from our front page. Our partners at the libraries and Adult Learning also frequently run short courses in good IT use.
Simply put be careful of who you disclose your personal information to and be suspicious of all emails you receive.
Your internet browsing is safer at home or via your mobile phone than using a public WiFi access point or shared computer (at a library for example).
Often, mobile phones and tablets running apple or Google software (android) are less prone to viruses and malware than desktop computers or laptops.
Anti-virus software needn’t cost you money. Use Microsoft Security Essentials on a Windows computer. On a mobile device simply ensure you are running the latest software
Citizens Advice – a good general page of advice for staying safe online
As Community Learning starts to deliver courses remotely we would like to remind tutors and learners to be careful with their data usage as well as their safety online.
Data usage – refers to the amount of information you can download from the internet. Sometimes this will be small amounts (emails, some webpages) and sometimes hug amounts (video calls, Youtube, iPlayer)
If you are accessing the internet via broadband or a mobile phone contract which is not unlimited, you need to be especially careful that you are able to track how much data you are using. Whilst some internet providers have increased the amount of data you are allowed to use in response to the pandemic, some have not.
Many of the learning materials we provide are videos and we are also encouraging people to meet up in video chats to stay in touch. If, as a learner, you have any concerns that you may not be able to access these resources due to data limits please speak to your tutor.
Examples of data usage (these are rough estimates and can vary on the speed of your connection)
1000KB = 1MB
1000MB = 1GB
Low usage
Email: 75KB
Email attachments: 1-10MB
Medium usage
Whatsapp audio call: 12MB per hour
Web surfing: 50MB per hour
High Usage
Zoom: 1 – 2GB per hour
Youtube: 2- 16GB per hour
SAFETY ON AND OFF LINE
It’s easier to spot a scam if you know what to look for.Be careful if something:
- Comes out of the blue or from someone you don’t know
- Sounds out of the ordinary – like you’ve won the lottery, or you’ve been invited to invest in an ‘amazing’ scheme and keep it a secret
- Asks you to pay for something in advance – especially by bank transfer
- Asks you for personal information – like your bank details, computer passwords or PIN numbers
- Pressures you into buying something or making a decision quickly – a trustworthy company will be happy to wait
- asks you to phone an expensive number – these start with 070, 084, 087, 090, 091 or 098
- If you’re not sure if it’s a scam, check:
- The email or website address – if it’s a scam, it might have a strange address or come from a free email provider like Gmail
- for spelling mistakes – trustworthy websites are less likely to have them. If the website starts with https:// – this means the information you send on the website is secure, but the website could still be a scam
- If the website has a green padlock in the website address bar – this means the information you send on the site is private
- Never proceed unless you are absolutely certain your money will be safe. Once you transfer, it may be too late.
- Scammers will often try to hurry your decision making, always take a breath and think things through.
- Salesmen, in particular, should always give you time and space to make an informed decision, anyone who tries to rush you is not to be trusted.
PROTECTING CHILDREN
The most important thing is to talk to your children and build your own confidence in understanding the things they do online.Consider having your children use online services in a more public are of the house. If gaming you could insist on the audio coming through the TV instead of headphones so you can hear both sides of the conversation. Finally parents should look for parental controls which can be found on many tablets, phones, computers and game consoles. In the UK, 43 per cent of nine- to 12-year-olds have a social media profile. One in three is on Facebook despite the 13-year-old age limit. A quarter of those kids on Facebook never touch the privacy restrictions on their profile, and a fifth of them publicly display their address and/or phone number. Facebook claims it is powerless to stop children from lying about their age and creating accounts. This shows that many children are at risk online, when using social media, and how easy it is for others to be able to look at underage children and to contact them. For this reason setting up parental control over social media and also teaching parents, tutors and learners about the risks can be very beneficial. Here is a link to help you find out more information and to work out how to set up parental controls: NSPCC – keeping children safe online
TRUST
Facebook and Twitter are good for quick updates but can’t be trusted without fact checking as it can often just be a source of ’Fake news’ and very one sided or even just plain wrong.It’s very difficult to understand what is fake and real. Watch out for bloggers and news reporting companies posting alarmist and attention grabbing stories. This applies both on social media and on the general internet. These companies are very sneaky as they will post articles aimed at a very specific audience for clickbait on social media but may not do the same for their websites. Clickbait is content whose main purpose is to attract attention and encourage visitors to click on a link to a particular web page. These companies gain money when you click on an article, a lot of these articles could be full of rubbish from many years ago that they are resurfacing or simply a twisted story based on truth or just hearsay, in order for you to share it around with other people for them to essentially gain more money. This link is from the CBBC website. It’s an interactive link that you can do with your learners to understand the difference between real and fake news: BCC spot fake news
PRIVACY
SECURITY
When using a Windows computer do you have Windows Defender (or other virus scanner) installed and working? Can you start a manual scan of your computer? Windows Defender is completely free. Tablets and phones do not currently need anti-virus. The most important security measure is to keep software up to date
Security is a very big deal when you’re dealing with anything online. Lots of people stream media, online shop, google search, change passwords, use online banking etc. All of these things use your personal details to do this, whether that’s your bank card or simply your passwords which can link to accounts with your bank details or simply use it for identity theft. Hackers are able to gain these details if you don’t keep your personal information safe and it can be difficult when you’re buying from an online shop that seems legit but has cheaper products and hackers can end up stealing information if they hack those websites
Malware: Malware is a malicious software that is written with the intent of compromising a system and stealing the data available on the system. These programmes can perform a variety of functions some of which include stealing or deleting sensitive data, modifying the system’s core functionalities, and secretly tracking the victim’s activities. There are various factors that can lead to the installation of malware in your system. One is running an older or pirated version of an operating.
Trojans: This type of malware tends to create backdoors in your security to let attackers monitor your activities remotely. It disguises itself as legitimate software or is included in legitimate software that has been tampered with.
Spyware: Spyware is malware designed to spy on you. It hides in the background and tracks everything you do online, including your passwords, credit card numbers, surfing habits, and chats. It can record keystrokes, videography you from your webcam and even listen from your microphone.
Keylogger: This is a specific form of spyware that simply records the keys you type and where you type them. These logs are then sent to the attacker who can analyse them to find your passwords, chats, credit card numbers and much more.
Be very careful when downloading apps as well. Malicious apps may contain a code snippet that can install malware on your device. Besides this, the app may ask for unnecessary permissions that hackers may misuse to extract critical data including your contacts, messages, and media.
This is a link to more information on what to look out for:
economic times – internet security
This link is to a website called ‘TechRadar’ which is a very highly rated technology reviewer and information on the latest technology and general tech gadgets and internet help: