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| Safety card unveiled to protect children online |
| Thursday, August 03, 2006 at 18:21 by Simon Spicer |
A new scheme has been adopted by the UK, US, Canada and Australia in an attempt to prevent online predators from masquerading as children in online chatrooms.
The adoption of the virtual ID card called Net-ID-me (a secure electronic identity card) is hoped to improve children's online safety and can be used in chatrooms, instant messaging and social networks to help prove that they are in fact children and not adults pretending to be children.
The ID card can be obtained by users aged under 18 who must have the consent of a parent or guardian who completes the form with them and then has it signed or stamped by the child's school. Applications must then be verified by credit or debit card details before final additional checks are made to the application. The company behind the ID card, said it uses software techniques "similar to those used by the passport agency" to authenticate applications for the ID card.
The IDs are confirmed only if both parties have entered their e-mail address and passwords into the service. It enables both parties to verify the first name, age and general location of the person they are communicating with before an online chat commences.
The card costs £10 a year and it is hoped that it will substantially reduce the risk of young children being targeted by adults.
Although the introduction of this ID card is a big step forwards in terms of helping to protect our childrens safety, all parents and young people are advised to remain vigilant to potential dangers and ensure no personally identifiable information is shared with online
strangers.
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| How many parents are going to actually let their children do this? I think most will be too paranoid/lazy. Plus, a paedaphile with children (and I imagine there are a lot in this world) could easily use their own kid's ID, presumably. This is a well-meaning idea but it wouldn't work unless everyone had to have one by law, and it was a crime to log on with someone else's ID. Perhaps it is a stepping stone/experiment to see how receptive people are to this idea? Surely the real solution is for kids to meet online friends only with company of a responsible, trusted adult? This is the safest way to meet people 'from the internet' anyway, for everyone. |
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