Online Safety

NCTA President and CEO Michael Powell visited Fox Business this morning. While there he discussed online security and the importance of understanding the constantly evolving technology around us.

Last week brought a closer look at the actual online behavior of kids with the release of the new Pew Report, “Teens, Kindness and Cruelty on Social Network Sites.” The in-depth study examines teens’ use of social network sites, their experiences and behaviors on the sites, their privacy and safety concerns, and the role of parents in digital safekeeping.

Yesterday, the FCC held the Generation Mobile forum, which brought together teens, parents, educators and experts to discuss the opportunities and challenges around mobile technology use (Read about it on the FCC’s blog or the NYT’s Bits blog).

Online safety and Internet literacy are still a big challenge for many broadband users.  Cable ISPs and content providers have acknowledged this for some time and worked to address the issue in a lot of ways.

With the near nationwide deployment of broadband and millions of mobile devices infiltrating American homes, more and more children are going online everyday at home, in schools and wirelessly on the go.

A little over a year ago, we posted about the PointSmart.ClickSafe. initiative, which focused on media literacy and online safety. Specifically, I reported on the Online Safety Summit we held last June (as well as interviews with a couple of the participants).