Unicef’s Shima Islam advises parents to use ‘privacy settings’ to monitor children’s internet use

A senior Unicef official in Dhaka has said making parents and carers aware is key to ensuring that children are safe on the internet.

Syeda Shima Islam, the head of communication and awareness, told a dialogue on Safer Internet, hosted by bdnews24.com on Saturday, parents must use “privacy settings” to monitor their children’s online activities.

“Internet is something that children should be encouraged to use, but our perspective is parents should have an open dialogue with the children about the internet use,” she said.

State Minister for Post and Telecommunications Tarana Halim, State Minister for ICT Zunaid Ahmed Palak, RAB Director General Benazir Ahmed, BTRC Director General Brig Gen Md Emdad ul Bari and computer science teacher and researcher Dr Nova Ahmed were the other discussants.

bdnews24.com Editor-in-Chief Toufique Imrose Khalidi moderated the dialogue organised against the backdrop of widely reported incidents of abuse and harassment on and through the Internet.

Internet users are growing by the minute in Bangladesh as the latest figure until June this year put the total number of users around 48.35 million which was 10.5 million more than the previous year.

However, according to the regulator BTRC, mobile-phone internet users comprise 97 percent of the total internet users.

More and more users are getting vulnerable to cybercrimes and suffering data breach in evolving cyber social reality.

Discussants at the dialogue

The threats have put safety in cyber society at the forefront of strategic priorities.

Children and young people are also spending a lot of time online as it becomes a great tool for them to socialise, explore and have fun.

But they also face risks like cyber bullying or seeing content that is inappropriate.

Shima Islam also reminded them that “it must be used with a sense of caution”.

She said even children could be taught about the privacy settings to make sure that they were being monitored if they misuse social media.

Replying to a question, she said Unicef was working with mobile-phone carriers on a roadmap for teaching parents on privacy settings.

But she insisted that everyone must “work together to make sure that the internet is safer for children”.

“It’s a new area for Unicef,” she said.

Islam said her organisation was using resources that they already had and using those in different ways.

“But it’s not just about the Unicef or the government.”

Shima Islam

She said parents, teachers, and caregivers should have open dialogue with their children “saying yes, the Internet is a very good tool but be aware as well of the pitfalls of using the Internet and make sure that people are aware of privacy settings”.

She, however, discouraged children from being on the Internet for long. “If your children spend four or five hours on the Internet, that’s also not good for them.”

Asked about the ‘BlackBerry riots’ in England and Hifazat-e Islam movement in Dhaka where children were used, the Unicef expert said they always believed children should not be used for political purpose.

But she said Unicef was “very keen” to create a space for the children to project their views and their problems and that’s why “we have partnered with bdnews24.com in order to have young journalists”.

hello.bdnews24.com is an initiative of Bangladesh’s first Internet newspaper, where children journalists write their own stories.