Online Resilience in the Week of Spring Fever

6/3/2024 - The Week of Spring Fever has begun again, this time with "online resilience" as its central theme. This initiative, created twenty years ago by Rutgers, the Expertise Center on Sexuality and organized in collaboration with the GGD, offers elementary schools the opportunity to engage with children on the themes of resilience, relationships and sexuality in the offline and online world. 

Children spend a significant amount of their time on the Internet. This has its advantages; they find information about their bodies, relationships and sexuality and can easily connect with peers. In addition, they learn how to communicate about their boundaries - what they do and do not want. However, there are also risks associated with this online discovery and experimentation. For example, many children face online bullying and unwanted content, such as nude images, violent images or animal cruelty.  

Online resilience 

In consultation with the Children's Helpline, this year's focus is on online resilience, as children between the ages of 8 and 18 ask the Children's Helpline for a lot of advice daily about online issues, such as sexting or spreading nude images. Rutgers cites that two in three children between the ages of 9 and 12 have encountered nude images at some point.  

Teaching children about safe online behavior is therefore essential. This makes them more resilient on the Internet and helps prevent online (sexually) transgressive behavior.  

Thus, with the right information and education, most children can find their way in the online world in a confident and safe manner. However, preventing online risks is not only the responsibility of children themselves: it is a joint responsibility of, among others, the government, companies, education, educators and, of course, the users of digital services. 

The CRIA and the CCRO 

In this context, Considerati, commissioned by the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations, is actively engaged in promoting digital safety for children by, among other things, developing a Children's Rights Impact Assessment (CRIA), further developing the Code for Children's Rights Online (CCRO), and exploring ways to inform parents and children about online risks through an informing system. 

These tools are designed to encourage digital service providers to safeguard children's rights. They do this by assessing both positive contributions, such as promoting self-expression, and the risks, such as exposure to misleading information, of their products or services on children's well-being. In addition, the informing system should notify parents about the potential risks of a digital service so that they can make an informed choice about its use. 

Conclusion  

It seems that children's digital resilience in the online world is getting the attention it deserves. From government initiatives to education, and from digital service providers to parents and children themselves; many are doing their part this week to create a safer online environment for children. We look forward to an interesting week with a positive impact on the safety of the digital future.