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Simfin

online safety and digital citizenship specialist

Naace Impact Award Winner for Leadership

For his commitment to ensuring a safe and supportive learning environment for the education sector

What people say about simfin

  • ..Training first thing on a Monday morning... full of yawns and regrets as it was lovely and sunny outdoors... however Simon made the training interesting, engaging and most of all relevant to the work I do :-) 

    LSCB delegate 2014 Redcar and Cleveland

 Tagged with social media


06 February 2018

A lifetime online

The first “social media babies” are turning 13! Their childhoods have been shared online by their families- and they’re not always happy about it. As the babies born since the advent of Facebook become old enough to have their own accounts, should we rethink how much we share about our children?

 

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11 January 2018

Most social media platforms have a minimum age limit of
13, but research shows a growing number of children
aged under 13 are using social media, with 3 in 4 children
aged 10-12 having their own accounts.
While much is known about how teenagers use social
media, this research provides the missing piece to the
story, exploring the social media lives of children before
they reach the teenage years. In October and November
2017, we conducted 8 focus groups with 32 children
aged 8-12 to understand the impact of social media on
the wellbeing of this age group.

Read the report

12 December 2017

Professionals Guidance Digital Romance
Digital Romance was led by researchers Dr Ester McGeeney (Brook) and Dr Elly Hanson (NCA-CEOP), the research took place between January and May 2017 and used a mixed methods approach involving an online survey, in person focus groups and one-to-one interviews.

The project was motivated by the desire to evolve online safety education by providing an in-depth insight into young people’s views and experiences. The project was influenced by US research conducted by the PEW Research Centre (Lenhart, Smith & Anderson, 2015) that explored the digital romantic practices of young Americans. Arguably, up until now, much of the focus of online safety work has been narrow – exploring the risks of online communication such as the unsafe sharing of personal details, the loss of control of material (especially images), and the facilitation of abusive and bullying behaviours. At times this approach has been at the expense of acknowledging the positive role of digital technology in young people’s lives and the complicated ways in which young people experience and negotiate risk.

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05 December 2017

The use of live streaming platforms by online sex offenders is increasing and there is an urgent need to educate children about the risks associated with this new threat, warn child protection experts.

During a recent week of intensification to tackle child sexual exploitation and abuse, police and NCA operations across the UK safeguarded 245 children and arrested 192 people, 18 of whom were in a position of trust. 30% of those cases involved some of the highest harm offences including live streaming, blackmail and grooming.

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