Move to manage online activities of children

KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission is collaborating with five telecommunication service providers to offer parental control tools to help them monitor and manage their children’s online activities, the Dewan Rakyat was told.

Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil said parental control tools will enable parents to filter, limit and even block online content viewed by their children.

The five telecommunication service providers are CelcomDigi, Maxis, UMobile, Telekom Malaysia and TIME.

“Most social media platforms also have age restrictions for user accounts, allowing only those aged 13 and above to open social media accounts.

“To ensure compliance with these requirements, parents or guardians are held responsible for monitoring and supervising their children’s online activities.

This is because children can still benefit from positive content by browsing social media together with their parents or guardians,” Fahmi said.

He was responding to Kamal Ashaari (PNKuala Krau) on the ministry’s method to ensure that children under the age of 15 are banned from having social media accounts so that they do not follow bad trends on social media.

The minister said to address the risks and threats posed to children, whether from others or their own behaviour, the implementation of educational and awareness programmes about internet safety continues to be intensified.

He said these efforts are carried out through initiatives such as Klik Dengan Bijak (Click Wisely) and Malaysia ICT Volunteer at schools, as well as the National Information Dissemination Centre throughout the country.

“The implementation of these initiatives is strengthened through collaboration with other agencies in developing education modules on child online protection for parents, guardians and children,” he said.

On Kamal’s supplementary question regarding the need to incorporate digital citizenship aspects into the syllabus, Fahmi said it requires cross-ministerial cooperation such as with the Education Ministry, Digital Ministry and Higher Education Ministry.

“We will follow up on this good proposal, starting with discussions between the Communications Ministry and the Education Ministry on online safety aspects, but it can be expanded to the aspects mentioned earlier (digital citizenship),” he added. – Bernama