IGF 2021 – Day 2 – NRIs collaborative session: Securing the trusted Internet now for the generations to come

The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF virtual intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.

***

 

>>  JUTTA CROLL:  I shall moderate this session, I say we give it two minutes time for all the speakers entering the room and for more participants to come in.  Thank you for your patience.  Hello, Jutta Croll.  We are still waiting for some representatives who are supposed to be speakers in this session.  Please bear with me for another two minutes, and then at 10 past 5:00, we will definitely start with the session, thank you for your patience.

 

If you are there, just raise your hand so I get aware of you.

>> Audience: Can you hear us now, can anyone hear us in the Zoom room.  Post in the chat if you can.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Yes, we can hear you, I see you have some of the speakers, but I can't see in Zoom.

>> MODERATOR: We have Mary here, Jennifer, a number of us are in the audience.

>> JUTTA CROLL: That's wonderful, thank you.  I think we can start the session, thank you to all the attendees for your patience.

This is the collaborative session of the national regional initiatives, and it's titled securing the trusted internet now for the generations to come.  I'm very glad for your invitation to me to moderate this session.  Let me just give you a short introduction to what we are talking about today.

We have a situation where around the world, 1/3 of the users of the internet are under the age of 18.  That is the generation that has entered the internet environment, and there are future generations to come.  It is our task and our responsibility to make the internet as safe and secure as possible for users of today and for users of the future.  During the pandemic, we have seen a huge rise in internet usage over the last now nearly two years, and internet ‑‑ increased internet usage comes along with potentially increased risk of harm to the users, but also it opens new opportunities, especially for young users, where the internet should be a school, a library and a playground at the same time, and all these areas need to be safe for young users.

We have heard today in a session organized by the OECD that from the Carr project, and they have given research that this happens especially for children in phases of transition.  What does this mean?  It means, for example, young users who do their first steps into the internet.  For users, young users who have for the first time their individual device to go online, also for young users who make their first steps into unknown areas of the internet, be they social media or any certain app.

So in all these phases, they are in a situation where it might come to riskful behavior, to contact, to unknown people, to riskful conduct of their own, and that is what is addressed by the work of several organizations, institutions and individuals around the world.  We will hear in the first part of this from regional national representatives quite active in this area.  I would like to ask these representatives of national and regional initiatives to introduce themselves, I just will give you an overview on whom to expect to speak in the following nearly 60 minutes to come.  We have Kossi Amessinou from the economy of finance, IGF, Asia Pacific regional, Jennifer Chung from the south Asia foundation.  For the Italian IGF, Jacomo Masonna from the European broadcasting union, then we have the Spanish IGF, Felix Hernandez and Jorge Perez.  For Mauritius, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't pronounce your name well, but I try, Mahendranath Busgopaul, then from Namibia, Josaphat Vijanda Tjiho.  From the west African IGF, my former colleague, Mary Uduma.  And also from the former MAG member Layal Banyam from the Lebanon IGF

>> KOSSI AMESSINOU:  This is Kossi Amessinou from Benin.  Children don't have access to internet or computer, don't have access on internet when we ‑‑ SmartPhone is on the internet.  When we have the image, video online, that is in some party event by a person coming from the same family with them, is not their job, is not done but themself.  We have people who use the phone or with computer from ‑‑ that's people who have two kinds of problem.  Sometimes we have to listen the image of video, it is not the video for their age.  Video supposed to have for themself, they give SmartPhone to children, they are looking at video talking about sex or something like that.

Remember one program you have in our country for children who go and test something with where mom SmartPhone, they need to test it brother.  We don't know why, we have idea, but every time we have a video in their mom phone, and it is something good, supposed to test, but that is some bad situation we can't have, when they don't know how to protect information which you can't assess on the computer on the laptop.

Some families give SmartPhone to their children because we need to contact them when we are in school or home.  People who are making jobs sometimes don't have time to look at their children, they are given SmartPhone, but sometimes we don't control who runs the SmartPhone, some people use ‑‑ some children use their SmartPhone to go online, normally there to go and see some bad video which cannot not normally be used for them, they use it, and some time, is it possible for us as government to make something for those peoples.  Normally, yes, you have some strategies, you have child protection policy, you have also a child protection digital code, but that is document.  Document does not work really with people.  For parent, for school, for whole person or so.  The thing we do in school, for example, is let the digital manage us in the education ministry, to go to the school where you have a platform or student, the platform will support you, that he platform to make study.

We will make it fit on the platform to children only use the information concerning their study.  Not possible for them at school to use any kind of information.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Kossi, I may interrupt you, we only have 60 minutes for this session, I think it would be good if you could come to a close and we go further with the other seven speakers with we have in this session and get back to the examples you have already been drawing on.

>> SOUHILA AMAZOUZ: Ministry for education, we ask the people who are charging technology to make that student in all our countries have internet, but only for education.

Thank you.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you so much.  Then we come to Jennifer Chung for Asia Pacific regional IGF.  I would be happy if you could focus on what are the concrete problems affecting child online safety at the communities there, and could you gulf an overview on policies ‑‑ give an overview on national levels.

>> JENNIFER CHUNG: Thank you.  This is Jennifer from the Asian‑Pacific regional IGF Secretariat.  This year at our hybrid meeting that was posted online in the pal was on digital education literacy for children and use in underserved communities in rural areas, the very first thing we look at is the cost of access, without that, they are actually not even online, I think very much emphasis is placed and getting youth online to continue their e‑education and education curriculum, and then subsequently, the onus is actually place emphasis on net safety.  There is emphasis on the educators and parents.  Because the COVID pandemic, there is a greater need to push out the education curriculum in a way that will be beneficial and not detrimental to children and young students.  This is not only in economies in Asia Pacific that has less resources, this happens in economies such as Japan and Australia, in countries rich in resources, it is quite surprising for us to find out that 5 percent of school children in Japan do not have access to be able to continue their homework or even their online courses.

So that is the first thing we were talking about in the regional level.  In terms of the net safety, there is a lot one of work that needs to be done, not only in the education sector, it is also a big multistakeholder collaborative effort, when we are looking at content online, or if we are looking at content we are trying to push or allow students to access, there is definitely an emphasis placed on trying to protect them as well as give them agency, young children and youth, they have a right to their education, of course, and the emphasis needs to be placed on how to use the net safely, how to allow students to connect and to be able to continue their education without being preyed on by unsavory or malicious attempts to exploit them.

I want to wrap here very quickly because I want to hear more from our NRI colleagues to hear what best practices are from your point of view.

>> JUTTA CROLL: I directly hand over to Jacomo Matsona for the Italian regional initiative.

>> Jacomo:  The child protection was one of the main topics of the IGF this year in November, held in hybrid form.  There were various workshops dedicated to this issue, it was discussed in others, we had the participation of the Ministry of Education, at the event, because the ‑‑ as has been mentioned by my previous speaker, the problem of the access to the learning and to the experience was really hampered by the COVID crisis.

As you know, in Italy, we call it that because the distance, remote learning experience.  So the problem is that this immediately evoke the problem of the lack of access, lack of computer facilities and electronic devices accessible to the children, lack of education of the parents to helping the children in accessing courses.

So it was a very bad test for the country, and we discovered that we are very vulnerable and there is a part of the population, even ever small, was totally cut out from the experience.

The second main problem that ‑‑ which we focused in Italy this year has been shocking experience that happened at the very beginning of the year in Sicily.  12‑year student watching on Tik Tok some dangerous exercise copied this exercise and she died.  She was not at home, nobody can help her, she suffocated.  This was a huge scandal, of course, and there was a huge problem all over the media about the dangers of the internet.

As an immediate reaction, the authority that normally is not competent on that, but it was the only thing that can intervene, made the ban for Tik Tok, and other social media saying that until they would not prove to the authorities they are able to verify the age, they cannot operate on the internet.

So this was shocking, but in one month, especially Tik Tok, that was the most on the accusation, they reacted and put in place measures.  Of course, these measures have not worked properly, so journalist inquiry made in September showed that even after the measure has been implemented, was still possible to bypass the new rules and the new system of control.

Nothing is perfect, of course, but the debate is there, and now we are in the course of implementation of, but this would be the next round, I will mention more in the next intervention, if any.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you so much, Jacomo, and especially for outlining this horrible example.  I think we can go back to prevention strategies and measures probably but be best to address those events.

I'm looking for someone from the Spanish IGF, do we have Hernandez or Jorge Perez Martinez in the room?  I don't see them in Zoom.

If they are with you in the room, I would first go to Mauritius IGF, Mahendranath.  You have the floor.

>> MAHENDRANATH BUSGOPAUL:  I am Mahendranath Busgopaul from the IGF Mauritius, I'm not onsite button ‑‑ I am not on site, but online.  The internet is a basic necessity and pertaining to child online safety.  As one of the colleagues just said, we held in Nuremberg this year, also this perspective leading to child online safety.  So the COVID situation has highlighted the importance of the internet and how much we rely on it as a society.

On a particular note is she fact that children have had to make use of the internet in order to be able to follow the classes.  Numerous issues have been identified with regards to online schooling, such as impact on social development of children, lack of motivation or a look of engagement to the material.  We shall, however, be focusing on cybersecurity and child online safety.

Now, there are more children in the world, as it is a case of being a frequent user of the internet.  They face more cyberthreats.  It included unregulated, online gaming, on its own, it is not necessarily harmful.  However, an increasing number of games are now using malicious tactics to force children to buy more and more, these methods might be similar to online betting.  Over the past few years, we have seen the rise of more and more tactics on the side of social media.  Such as using shorter videos to keep holding younger and younger viewers, this I would like to highlight was REFLECTED at our annual IGF meeting this year.

We have seen a massive jump in SmartPhone access, this addiction can lead to the propagation to harmful trends, using the social media not only children get, but adults also.  Harm commonly faced by children.

Apps can be used to deliver malware.  Additionally, ads can be especially harmful on the internet and more likely to reach a young your audience ‑‑ younger audience.

We have several initiatives launched taken by the stay to help eradicate online threats facing our children.  The data protection act, information and communication technologies act, and the computer misuse and cybercrime act.  The National computer board, which is under the Aegis of the Ministry of Our city, has set the computer emergency and response team.  The main road to handle security issues at a national level in Mauritius.  The online system introduced under the name, Mauritius cybercrime online reporting system.  This allows the public to report cybercrime.  It also helps to provide advice to help in recognizing and avoid common types of cybercrime, on social media website.  And child initiatives can be summarized into three headings, practicing and mechanism, roles and responsibility on the internet and public and private sector accountability.  If anyone has any questions pertaining to three headings I just said, I would be happy to respond to them.  Jut ta, thank you so much.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you for your intervention.  I'm glad to hear how much Mauritius has already undertaken.

We go to the Namibia IGF.  Josaphat Vijanda Tjiho.  Are you there in the room on the Zoom?  I can't see him.

On the Zoom list.  So, again, I would say we go further, Mary, I know you are in the room in Katowice, I would like to give you the floor right now for the west African IGF.

>> MARY UDUMA: Thank you for giving me the floor, my name is Mary Uduma.  I'm speaking on for west Africa IGF, as well as Nigeria.

Though in west Africa our theme was not on child safety, but we did inclusion as an extension, we needed the children to be included, as the preamble, I want to say that our region is suffering from a crisis, and we found out our children are being recruited online to go to terrorism.  So it's a thing of concern for us, just because we are seeing COVID brought about more children ‑‑ school children going online.  There is the issue of them dying from the education they are supposed to concentrate on and visit other site and get recruited to be terrorists.  So is important that we make sure that they are not recruited and also they are not ‑‑ they are not recruited online.  What do we do?

We want to see where innovators or creators of content would take into consideration the needs of the children and not just serve their software.  The needs of the children should be taken into consideration.  We want to see that parents are interested teachers and interested.  At Nigerian level, we are ‑‑ there is a law now that ‑‑ a policy now in Ministry of Education that all teachers should be IT literate so that they can guide the children if they are going to use the new internet or their devices to access their classrooms so that it will not go beyond accessing classrooms to doing other things.  So a program going on in Nigeria for teachers, parents and also the educators.

So that's one of the things we have been doing because it's only when we catch them young, turn them about, cybersecurity issues in internet use age that we will be able to secure the future.  That's my intervention for now.

>> JUTTA CROLL: We turn now to Zeina Bou Harb from the Lebanon IGF.  The floor is yours.

>>  ZEINA BOU HARB:  The number of reported cases shove sexual exploitation and extortion against children increased from 24 cases of information and one case of kidnapping and murder in 2016, this number increased to 172 in 2019 and more in 2020.  That was an alarming augmentation to unit all necessary efforts from the government, the private institution, the civil society and internet providers to join their efforts in order to guide the children and provide them with skills that enable them to make the most of the digital world and prepare them for the requirement of the digital revolution, in addition to directing them towards safe and responsible use of the internet.  In fact, since a few years now, and every year, the council for childhood in Lebanon, a council under the Ministry of Social Affairs, dedicated the month of February to internet safety as a way to help children and parents and teachers to create safer cyber environment for children.

A nationwide awareness campaign is organized in collaboration with different partners from different stakeholders, and Lebanon NGOs are actively engaged on the national level when it comes to prevention of child abuse through capacity building and development.  Some organizations are currently working with the Ministry of Public Health to integrate child protection into the health care system in Lebanon and working with the Ministry of Interior to provide training on child protection for the ISF, the internal security forces and municipal police agents.

If I may share two activities that were recently done in Lebanon to build capacity, in addition to the awareness campaign, it's the drafting, dissolution of an internet safety ‑‑ distribution of an internet safety booklet and a launch of a competition called the internet.  It was prepared in collaboration between multiple stakeholders also, including the ISP's and the government and the NGOs, it was in both forms, digital and also printed and distributed for free and whatever possible.  That would teach children how to act smartly while using the internet.  That was an easy, fun and accessible way for children and their parents to learn more about the cybersafety.

The competition, it's called the champ of the internet competition.  Children were requested to create outward, link to online safety.  Two category, eight categories, the first category was for the age 8 to 12 and second category from 13 to 17 years old, the theme of the first category, younger category was self‑esteem and respect of others on the internet and for the second category, it was management of the digital reputation and identity.

So each participant can submit at least one artwork in any form, whether a poster or a drawing or a short video of two minutes in any language, Arabic or English, the submission should respect intellectual property, shouldn't be copied, shouldn't be presented in other competitions.  There was a selection committee and criteria, and tablets were distributed to the winners.

This mainly was the most fun activity that we have done in Lebanon.  Thank you.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Yes, thank you, Zeina.  You have given us the perfect segueway to step forward to examples of good initiative implemented at local levels to respond to the issues.

I would like to summarize what we have heard, there are so many similarities, but also differences in the local and national situation, we have heard from Benin that there is a look of education, that doesn't count also for young children, but also for their parents that don't have the skills to guide their children and to sometimes the situation is very difficult because the children use the devices of their parents without any guidance, not to access age inappropriate content.

We have heard from Jennifer from Asia, 5 percent of school children don't have access to the internet, although they're supposed to have online education during the pandemic, and that it's more difficult in underserved areas where children are lacking access and digital information literacy.  We have heard from Italy and especially, difficult case where a child came to death while she copied a challenge that she had seen on Tik Tok.  So that featured very prominently in the Italian IGF.  It became more obvious that children's access to education was hampered during the pandemic when they were supposed to have online education.

What I've found really confusing was that we have heard about this advertising of delivering malware by delivering advertising from Mahendranath Busgopaul and also they faced, like in many other regions the internet is a basic necessity, which became more obvious during the pandemic, which was highlighted, how much we depend on the internet and on the other hand, we see several, several situations where there are more threats to children, especially, than benefits from the internet.

You have given us some examples on the legislation that you've taken from the reporting system that is in place for users, and I think we would like to hear more from you, how this is working effectively and what are the roles and responsibilities of the stakeholders involved.  Another issue that was mentioned by Mary Uduma, the recruitment of children for terrorism activities, especially during the pandemic when children spent more time online because they were supposed to have their education online.

She mentioned also that IT literacy features very prominently on the agenda.  And last but not least, especially from Lebanon, we heard the increase of cases on sexual exploitation of children, on child abuse and how necessary it is to join efforts with internet providers, that is one issue I would like you to address in your statements now to come, how far have you come with responsibility.  Is there kind of cooperation with a platform providers, do we see that digital literacy education as one strand of prevention, and how far have you come in your regions and country and I would open up the floor not only for the panelists, but participants in the room to evenings to these questions, and because we have only a short time, I would like to bring forward a question that was put into the chat by Fred Clark.  He would like to know if there are alternatives to keep children and teens protected from harmful, dangerous games, can any one of you, if you have in your region or in your country laws or norms to protect children from access to harmful games.  I would like to open the floor again for panelists, but also for participants from the room, if you would like.

Jacomo m:  There was a pan from Tik Tok that lasted for three months, they would not be able to put in place the measures.  The measure was you apply for getting Tik Tok user name and then you receive a call and in the call, they try to understand if you are a child or not.  Of course, this is not perfect, and there's been proof that it was not the perfect solution.  Anyway, it was a way to calm the situation that was very tense.

And since then, in the trans position of the media service directive, that is one of the European Union directives, closed responsibility for this kind of cases to the media authority in Italy.  So now the law has been approved just a few days ago and now the authority a special committee called committee media minors, they have the duty to prepare a regulation for the social media platforms, trying to prevent these kinds of things.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you, Jacomo.  Just to point out exactly, do you think that proper age clarification would help to solve such issues you've been facing in Italy.

>>  JACOMO:  It can be ‑‑ you can do stupid things even if you are an adult.  I don't think that this prevents.  Of course, the fact that she was alone at home, the child, because the parents were going to work, and she was left alone at home, was the reason why this young lady died.  Having an age verification is part of the possible solution, I agree on that.

>> JUTTA CROLL: I'm going to put a link into the chat to research that a research organization from the U.K. have done on dangerous challenges and hoaxes on Tik Tok, and it also has some recommendations for prevention of these cases, I'll put it in the chat in a minute.  Please, other panelists and participants, go forward, just speak out or raise your hand for me to see.

>>  MAHENDRANATH BUSGOPAUL:  Thank you.  My colleague speaker who just spoke, the question of age, I don't think we might go for it, just speaking the experience from the Indian ocean island region, when we go for advocacy program online, we talk to parents mainly, and this is something that might have ‑‑ I still believe if there are things that are happening with children online, parents should be made aware of what are the things that they need to do.  These are the things that we do, in Mauritius, we have also initiated the help line Mauritius, an online service where it's not only for children, it's more for parents who say my son or daughter are doing such and such thing, how can we help.  We believe it is the responsibility of the parents to look after these things and also to help the kids.  Thank you.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you for your intervention and for pointing out that reporting is part of effective prevention strategies.

I have two hands raised from the floor, and I take that in this order.  I see Mahee, and then Abdeldjalil.  Please go ahead, Mahee first.

>> MODERATOR: We have people here that raised their hands.

>> JUTTA CROLL: The two from the Zoom room and then back to the Katowice.

>>  MAHEE:  First of all, regarding the discussion regarding this game addiction, I just want to mention internet addiction was not identified as a disease, gaming addiction has been identified as an addiction.  It has been very serious problem for the children with the pandemic.  With the pandemic, children go online and work online, even from the primary schools, to the high‑level education, all the children have ‑‑ the only means of education through online.  So because of that, we have identified in Sri Lanka, many medical professionals have complained they are receiving a number of issues related to gaming addictions, what we identified within our communications with the community, the children and the medical specialist, what we identified is we had to advocate and share knowledge in between parents, teachers and the students.  Because the generation gap and the technology know‑how gap in between the generations made this issue (?) we have prepared some videos, we have prepared some actually films to educate these people.  So in my point, we need to address as a world to prevent internet gaming addiction, which is, at the moment, UNESCO has done a few guidelines on development of games, not to make children being abused through games, those are our points from Sri Lanka.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Now we go to Abdeldjalil.

>> Audience: I'm coming from Chad, from IGF Chad.  In Chad, also, we organized so it was our edition, we learn a lot of things because as children need to be trained, and some as children also in school, we see them more than their parents.  And some parents are not educated, a big challenge also, and we do some campaign at this school, the capital and we do some campaign, I was one of the teammates.  Some harassment for the girl.  So the power of education or the culture, some harassment girl cannot tell the parent, keep quiet, this was big challenge because there's one girl who share experience because some guys tell her to send e‑mail ‑‑ have to send the e‑mail please come to their place, and after that, we tell her that ‑‑ to go to the school and to the parent and police also because we know that people send the message only to have a big challenge also, I think that education and training, because when you went to school, some students need practical training also, how to use Facebook, Tik Tok, most people use Tik Tok and Whats App, some people deal with it easily, mix the video and put pressure to the girl.  So I think that now we can see the minister of education and UNICEF how to do a program, because most children are in school, and easily do survey, really difficult, we have the time after school and need to have a new approach with the teacher at the school and to have ‑‑ how to use internet and social media at the school.  So this is the new things we need to implement, things that can help also.  Some people who have an  amount, we cannot top, we need to have some studies.

>> JUTTA CROLL: May I ask you to stick to your time.  Thank you.  Thank you so much.

Now we have people in the room in Katowice who would like to take the floor.  Please go ahead.

>> Audience: My name is Nazily Nicholas from Tanzania IGF, we heard a very specific topic addressing the issue of online harms, and specifically we are focusing on how to develop legislation around child safety online, to have a specific ‑‑ so far Tanzania has no specific law to protect children online, despite having the cybersecurity act of 2015, it is not specifically geared towards kids, because on the statistics we have 29 million people who are internet users.  For the 2 million people in Tanzania, mobile subscribers, by extension, you have more than 42 million children actually accessing online harms ‑‑ accessing the mobile phones, and getting harmed online, because just imagine the kids who are in Africa, village somewhere, and therefore meant for the grandmother phone, and the kids sneak out on grandmother and uses the mobile phone, the SmartPhone to be able to access online content which is not geared towards it.

Specifically what we have done, IGF chapter, to engage policy makers, we have formed a working group that involves all multistakeholders, so we can be able to push for a new law that will be able to protect children online, and we believe that having a specific law on this will go far and wide in terms of protecting children who actually we need them to be able to be techies, but they have to have appropriate access the appropriate content.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you for your intervention, I do think there are still representatives of national regional initiatives in the room who want to speak up.  Yes, please.

>> Audience: Thank you very much, my name is (?) from Ghana IGF, I just have a few points to make.  Yes, I'm aware there are so many reporting platforms, but the question we should be asking ourselves, the platform to our appearance, that is one aspect we need to look at.  The other aspect is with regards to our various media houses, even for example Ghana, the media houses, you see them sometimes advertising certain content that isn't good for the child, yet you still have government do some policies, and nobody seems to care.  So we have to look at that, see what we can do in that regard.  We need the media as well, also need education, when it comes to a child online protection.

Also, parents as well, I think we mentioned parents, they also need education, we need to educate them.  Education aspect, especially in a developing world.  Most of them are not that IT inclined, sometimes they also have been caught up in this and you see them also spreading the information and sometimes have children to use such information.  In the rural communities, as for that, the issue there is huge.  Some of the communities we have internets, so we also have to look at that.  Included in the process ‑‑ start including them in the process.  Also, government in a developing country, we have these government information centers, they are supposed to educate the public, and most of them, you don't see them doing some of these things.  There isn't that ‑‑ (?) I am not aware, if they are aware, what are they going to tell the public, we need to start looking at that and start educating them so that they can carry out some of this information and educate the public.  Thank you.

>> JUTTA CROLL: Thank you for your input to this session as well.

To sum up, because we only have two minutes left, one could get a very dystopian impression from all the reports and the very difficulties that you've put into the agenda of the session, on the other hand, I think we have lots of good examples already heard from the different regions, I'm very glad that the National regional initiatives have put child online safety so prominently on their agenda because I think it needs a joint effort from all regions around the world.  Even though there are differences in the issues and duties and problems they face, there are some similarities and there are some possible solutions that we could probably draw on and work on together.

In the chat, Fred Clark suggested to compile a list of dangerous games, harmful content, challenges that people may face, that children may face and then try to address this properly.

I would say that we must be an ongoing effort, joint effort, who would be better positioned than national and regional initiatives to do so.  But at the same time, I would say we do not need a list of dangerous issues, we also need a list of instruments that have been working, that will work in the future, especially in regard of prevention.  Education was mentioned as one very important instrument, and we know we have different situation, how children can address with education, especially when it comes to the situation we have right now, education mainly takes place in an online environment.  The internet could be a safe school for children, but on the other hand, we need to have effective protection measures and prevention instruments in place.

So to conclude with a positive outlook in the future, I would like to refer you to the ‑‑ in March this year, published general comment No. 25 on the rights of the child in the digital environment, where the U.N. committee on the rights of the child has laid down how to understand children's rights, to protection, provision and participation in the digital environment, in these days.  And there you will find a lot very useful information, how to ensure that children can access the digital environment without being endangered.

With that, I would like to conclude this session, thank you so much for all the participants that have shown interest in child protection and for all the initiatives that come from the national and regional initiatives on Internet Governance, thank you so much for everything me ad your moderator, I hope you enjoyed the session and looking further to forward cooperation with you.