Before, young people were told to use the internet in moderation because too much of anything could be bad. But because of the COVID-19 pandemic, students are forced to spend more time daily, which makes them even more vulnerable to various online threats.

The Philippines’ National Privacy Commission (NPC) launched Kabataang Digital, a collaborative effort among government agencies and private groups to provide a safer zone for online activities of the youth. It is part of its Privacy, Safety, Security and Trust Online (PSST! Online) program.

Kabataang Digital (loosely translated as Digital Youth) encourages data protection for children by enjoining school officials and parents in educating their children on appropriate digital citizenship, promoting safe choices, and elaborating the implications of the digital environment for children’s privacy rights. It hopes to increase awareness on how they can exercise their data privacy rights and identify the types of information that can and cannot be shared online.

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“Without proper guidance in being a responsible digital citizen, all of you, instead of using digital tools to improve yourselves, your families and the country, would instead be vulnerable targets of discrimination and stigma, unfair decision-making based on profiling, identity theft, bullying, and other digital harms,” said Privacy Commissioner Raymund Liboro at the launch of the campaign recently.

The youth were also reminded to be mindful of what they share online because all posts must be assumed to be for public consumption.

Online education is not limited to learning. Teachers, students, and parents also the school management sytem to enroll, pay, or update their data in the school’s internal portals. It means that any activities conducted on the cloud or school server is at risk and susceptible to cyber threats.

Besides online learning, questions about screen times for children, validating fake news, hacking, cyberbullying, sexual harassment and other issues were directed at the panel of experts.

NPC launched Kabataang digital together with the Department of Information and Communications Technology, the Department of Education, Google, Globe Telecom, and PLDT-Smart.