Bhubaneswar: UNICEF released its annual flagship report ‘The State of the World’s Children 2017: Children in a Digital World’ in the city Monday. The report was released by Prafulla Samal, Minister W&CD, SSEPD, MSME and Mission Shakti, Nikhil Kumar Kanodia, IPS, DIG of Police, CID CB, Orissa (IG Crimes) and Yumi Bae, Chief, UNICEF Orissa along with 45 adolescents and young people from different organizations and institutions in the city who shared their thoughts on the digital power and how to utilize the digital forum.
The report talks about different ways digital technology is affecting children’s lives, identifying dangers as well as opportunities. It argues that governments and the private sector have not kept up with the pace of change, exposing children to new risks and harms and leaving millions of the most disadvantaged children behind.
The release of the report was accompanied by a moderated discussion between the adolescents and youth with invited dignitaries. Issues raised by children and youth were experiential and wide ranging – access to technology, its use and benefits, harms of being online and laws that govern technology and its impact.
Yumi Bae, Chief, UNICEF Orissa said, “Despite children and young people’s massive online presence – one in three internet users in the world is a child, too little is done to protect them from the perils of the digital world and to increase their access to safe content online. Governments, private sector, communities, and media need to come together to provide equitable and quality access, while ensuring that the rights of all children are protected as they navigate the online space, very often unsupervised and alone.”
The report explores the benefits digital technology can offer to all children, especially the most disadvantaged – increasing their access to information, building skills for the digital workplace, and giving them a platform to connect and communicate their views.
It also shows that millions of children are missing out. Around one third of the world’s youth – 346 million – are not online, worsening inequities and reducing children’s ability to participate in an increasingly digital economy.
It examines how the internet increases children’s vulnerability to risks and harms, including misuse of their private information, access to harmful content, and cyber bullying.
Nikhil Kumar Kanodia said that the recent cases of viral obscene videos of boys and girls had shown that digital media has its dangerous effect if not used favourably. He said that besides awareness interaction between police and citizen is very important where the police can advised them about how to tackle the online platforms.
Samal said that advantage of digitization can’t be downplayed, notwithstanding its dangers. He said that better connectivity is need, especially in rural areas. He said that students are doing wonderful things through use of digitization, especially in the field of science. We must work towards making the digital world more effective for the student’s development.
PNN