Naive children who believe everything they read online

BRITAIN appears to be raising a generation of dangerously naive children who believe everything they read on the internet.

Worryingly, a fifth of youngsters aged between 12 and 15 have unquestioning faith in information they find via search engines like Google, say watchdogs.

Often they are unable to tell the difference between reliable academic research and blogs posted by individuals with a hidden agenda.

Two thirds cannot differentiate the paidfor listings that appear at the top of search results from the ‘genuine’ ones below.

Children are also alarmingly credulous on social media – raising concerns that they could be preyed on by online scammers, paedophiles or jihadi recruiters. Nearly one in ten youngsters aged eight to 15 believe information on social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube is ‘all true’, communications watchdog Ofcom said in a report.

The figure has more than doubled from the 4 per cent recorded last year.

The findings challenge widespread assumptions that children who have grown up with the internet – so-called ‘digital natives’ – are automatically savvier about the online world. James Thickett of Ofcom said many lacked the ‘nous to work out what is helpful and what might be a scam’. ‘They’re not stopping and thinking,’ he added.

Encouragingly, the report found more than nine in ten parents now manage their children’s internet usage in some way to block unsuitable material.

But the average youngster aged between eight and 15 now spends 15 hours a week glued to the internet – a figure that has more than doubled in a decade.

Many were blind to the role advertising plays online, and how product placement works, Ofcom said.

Just over half realised that YouTube makes its money from advertising, despite the fact that they play during nearly every online video.

And less than half were aware that people who post online videos for a living – so-called ‘vloggers’ – are often paid to endorse particular products.