One out of three online users are child under 18 years of age. More than 3rd of young people have been victim of cyber bullied in 30 countries. Related to sexual abuse or online exploitation, approx. 80% of children in 25 countries faced the danger. In 2020, NCMEC CyberTipline received 21.7 million reports of suspected CSAM, an increase of 28 per cent from 2019. Thee are the number taken from the report of UNICEF. But these numbers are showing how vulnerable children and young population is while they are on the internet.
Recently in Pakistan efforts have been placed regarding the online protection for children. In order to bring awareness and to have the discussion over this sensitive topic, Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication, Pakistan (MoITT), and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) (United Nations) organized one conference in Serena Hotel (12-13 Dec, 22), Islamabad, Pakistan. Experts and professionals from different field of life joined the session including representatives from Ministry of IT and Telecommunication, Pakistan, ITU, Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), Telenor & Huawei Technologies.
Different questions were put forward by the organizers in front of guests who not only gave their ideas how to ensure secure and safe environment online to children but they also explained what steps their organizations have taken to this subject. ITU vowed to continue the discussion to come up with concrete action plan for MoITT in order to amend existing laws. One guest from Huawei Pakistan comment on the subject, “we as equipment and solution provider, has always taken cybersecurity and privacy protection as the company’s top priority and will continue to make contributions in this regard together with our telecom customer.”
