The Industry Trust for IP Awareness, in partnership with education children’s charity Into Film, has launched Staying Safe Online – Meet The Malwares, a short animation and educational resource aimed at teachers and young people, ahead of UK Safer Internet Day 2018.
The educational resource is intended for use in schools to engage with children aged 7-14 to underline how to stay safe online when accessing Film and TV content, whilst also developing their understanding of the different types of malware and their effects, including webcam hacks, the leak of personal data and online blackmail. This is supported by the Meet The Malwares animation which highlights the different types of virus that can affect a user’s computer or personal device.
Using Into Film’s Young Reporter Network, a selection of young people all provided the voices for the different characters in the Meet The Malwares animation, with the accompanying teaching resource including case studies detailing the all too real scenarios that young people can experience when it comes to the unwanted sharing of private images and online extortion.
The launch coincides with UK Safer Internet Day, which offers numerous opportunities to highlight the positive uses of technology and to explore the role we all play in helping to create a better and safer online community. It calls upon young people, parents, carers, teachers, social workers, law enforcement, companies, policymakers, and the wider community to join together in helping to create a better internet.
Will Gardner, CEO of Childnet, and Director of the UK Safer Internet Centre, said: “I’m delighted to see the collaboration between The Industry Trust and Into Film taking shape in the form of a brand new educational resource and accompanying animation, detailing the threat malware can cause whilst accessing pirated material online. Whether you are a young person, parent, carer, school or organisation, there are steps that each person can take to make the internet a safer place. It is collaborations such as these which helps to ensure Safer Internet Day has the desired positive outcome, especially as it reached 42% of UK children in 2017 and is growing year on year. To have two of the UK’s leading organisations in their respected fields come together speaks volumes about the importance of the day, and I look forward to seeing this resource being introduced to classrooms across the UK.”