Belgacom and Microsoft partner to teach kids safety in the cloud

To mark Safe Internet Day on Tuesday, Belgian operator Belgacom has teamed up with Microsoft and Child Focus (The Foundation for Missing and Sexually Exploited Children) to deliver workshops in Belgian schools, teaching kids how to navigate the web safely by educating on the potential consequences of their online actions.

Safe Internet Day is organised every February 11 to promote the safe and responsible use of online technology including mobile phones to young people, who are increasingly dependent on online services.

To mark the occasion, Belgacom, Microsoft and Child Focus have mobilised 142 volunteers who will drop in on 287 classrooms in schools across Belgium and facilitate a series of workshops teaching pupils how to navigate the web safely, avoiding fishing and malware sites, as well as how to secure their internet-connected devices.

“Nowadays children come into contact at a very young age with the endless possibilities of computers and the internet. Teachers are aware of the possible risks that the world wide web brings and would like their pupils to know how to use the Net safely in their free time as well,” the organisations said.

“The aim of the Belgacom and Microsoft campaign is therefore to teach pupils to think critically during their web activities, to teach them to ask the right questions and to realize what the potential consequences could be of a certain type of online behaviour.”

The goal of the initiative is to help kids develop safe browsing practices earlier, which has taken on renewed importance with the rise of social media and cloud services both at work and in private life. According to Microsoft’s research, despite the fact that 66 per cent of Belgians over the age of 18 consider themselves to be “in the best position” to protect themselves in terms of security and online reputation, only one in five use secure networks while browsing and only one in three use passcodes to secure their mobile devices.

This article originally appeared on Business Cloud News