IT’S A WEB OF WOES AT 30
At its ripe old age of 30 and with half the globe using it, the World Wide Web is facing growing pains with issues like hate speech, privacy concerns and state-sponsored hacking, its creator Tim Berners-Lee says. The 63-year-old Englishman is calling on governments, firms and citizens to work together, and wants the Web to become more accessible to those who aren’t online
dubai — Cybersecurity and enhancing digital citizenship took the spotlight in the World Wide Web’s 30th anniversary on Tuesday.
The founder of the www, Tim Berners Lee, also focused on highlighting the importance of fighting hacking and online abuse in a letter he published on his website.
In Dubai, Cisco — a global tech giant — held a panel session where IT experts, educators and regulators gathered to discuss how to protect youngsters against online dangers.
The advisor of IT at the Ministry of Education (MoE), Amro Jaber, was one of the speakers, who said they are teaching kids ethical hacking to prepare them as responsible digital citizens.
“One of the key initiatives at the MoE is digital literacy. It is part of our education process. We provide all our students and teachers with laptops and all our classrooms are connected with Internet. The students themselves are surrounded with technology in the schools. Our philosophy for online safety is not over-monitoring their activity, blocking websites or preventing them to go on social media, but we are promoting it. We are doing it in the context of guiding them and providing them with training programmes,” Jaber said.
“We are training our teachers how to coach the students in and outside the classroom on how they can be better digital citizens. In our academics, we are constructing our curriculums to not only teaching students in programming languages, but we also give them training on cybersecurity. We have labs where we teach them ethical hacking. With these skills, these students will know how to react when they are facing struggles online.”
Neal Oates, assistant head of the Dubai British School, said that children need to be aware of their digital footprint — as information about them online can “follow them forever”.
He said their school has implemented a number of programmes to help the children be aware of the challenges the online world can present, and how to overcome them.
“In the last decade since I’ve qualified as a teacher, technology has completely transformed what a classroom looks like and what students can do. In the last two-three years, since transformation of social media and data, the risks and stakes have increased. The disputes before young people that happened in person are now happening online. It amplifies the issue for young people because it puts on a global platform for their dispute,” Oates said.
“We need to teach them about being better global citizens, being responsible and talk to them about their digital footprint. What you do now at this stage will follow you for the rest of your life. When we were young, we didn’t have access to smartphones and digital devices. Now, once a photo has been taken and uploaded, it stays there and it follows them for the rest of their lives.”
Tech blogger Tamara Clarke has launched a book in partnership with Cisco, which teaches children about online safety.
Clarke will be doing school visits around the country with her book ‘The Super Surfer’, which will be distributed to students for free.
Speaking to Khaleej Times on the sidelines of the event, Clarke said: “As a tech blogger, I give away things on my blog all the time and I’ve given away devices. But I was given the opportunity to give anti-virus software for an entire family and I got very little feedback from that and people weren’t interested. So, I noticed that we’re consuming devices, we’re giving them to our kids but we weren’t taking that extra step to protect them.
“The book gives them three specific pointers — it tells them to consult an adult if they are being bullied because they don’t have to accept that kind of treatment online. It gives them an indicator of how to get around pop-up boxes, it does remind them that they should not share too much of their information online.”
I noticed that we’re consuming devices, we’re giving them to our kids but we weren’t taking that extra step to protect them.”
Tamara Clarke, tech blogger
We are training our teachers how to coach the students in and outside the classroom on how they can be better digital citizens.”
Amro Jaber, advisor of IT at the Ministry of Education
The disputes before young people that happened in person are now happening online. It amplifies the issue for them.”
Neal Oates, assistant head of the Dubai British School