Session
Child Online Safety
Round Table - 60 Min
The purpose of this forum is to explore how to properly regulate the use of emerging technologies to prevent and respond to various forms of safety issues that children encounter online. We will explore in depth how we can support the development of broader policies and interventions to keep children safe online, and explore providing concrete action plans, such as actions that China's Internet industry can take. The discussion will promote the implementation of the requirements of "providing a safe and healthy online environment for minors" stipulated in the Cyber Security Law of the People's Republic of China. The UNICEF released the Policy Guidance 2.0 on AI for Children, a global policy guide for governments and industry, in 2021, which contains practical advice and principles for child-centred AI. How to make good use of emerging technologies such as the Internet, maximize data integration and utilization, maximize protection of children's rights and safety on the Internet, and minimize restrictions and impacts on the healthy growth of children, will be the main topic of this forum. This forum will invite policy makers, industry practitioners, academic researchers and social workers in the field of children’s online protection to discuss together. The forum will provide comprehensive advice on how to use emerging technologies to keep children safe online, based on a full integration of industry, academia and public opinion. First, the forum will focus on three concerns: (1) What do children and their caregivers think about the online safety issues that children experience online? And what support is needed to keep children safe online? (2) In what ways can emerging technologies protect children from online abuse? For example, image and text identification technology can filter child pornography, intelligent recommendation technology can recommend beneficial content for children, and multi-modal technology can effectively identify children users. (3) How to properly regulate the use of emerging technologies? How to push Internet service providers to protect children's privacy and safety throughout the life cycle of their products? Emerging technologies can bring risks as well as benefits, such as excessive collection of personal information and invasion of privacy. Second, the challenges and opportunities related to the topic of this forum: with the continuous deepening of global digitization, the Internet is inevitably becoming a part of children's lives, but they may not have the skills to manage the risks that come with using the Internet and the Internet itself. Children face certain risks when using the Internet, including cyberbullying and harassment, excessive use of the Internet, exposure to violent content, and sexual exploitation and abuse. Emerging technologies, as strategic technologies that lead the next generation of technological revolution and industrial transformation, offer great potential for the realization of children's rights in the digital world. In real life, these technologies are often embedded in toys, applications and video games, unknowingly influencing every child's growth. To effectively avoid children suffering from various illegal infringements on the Internet, some companies in the relevant products began to explore the use of emerging technologies to protect children's online safety. For example, the application of emerging technologies in content review can accurately identify content infringing on children's privacy and filter the spread of inappropriate content for children, which will help enterprises to establish a long-term governance mechanism for online content involving children, curb the spread of illegal and undesirable information online, and purify the Internet environment for children. Finally, this forum will also share the experience of emerging technologies in protecting children's online safety, with a focus on how to ensure that emerging technologies provide protective and supportive services for children's users in the company's internal product development and management policies. At present, many internet companies around the world have integrated different emerging technologies into their products to protect children's online safety. Through experience sharing, we can gain a deeper understanding of the efforts made by internet companies in protecting children's online safety from management, technology, and other perspectives. Agenda (60 Min): 1. (2 Min) The moderator will introduce the topics of the forum, including the current situation of children’s online trolling, online sexual exploitation and abuse, and will give the topics to be discussed. 2. (8 Min) The head of the organizer will share the results of the survey on children's online safety needs conducted by the UNICEF and the China Federation of Internet Societies (CFIS) this year. Onsite and online participants will be invited to share their views on the online safety issues experienced by children while using Internet, as well as their caregivers, and what support is needed to ensure their online safety. 3. (20 Min) The onsite speakers will share their respective perspectives. The speech topics include but are not limited to: (1) In what ways can emerging technologies protect children from cyberbullying? (2) How to reasonably regulate the use of emerging technologies to ensure children's online safety from different aspects such as policy and governance architecture, judicial capacity building, reporting and referral mechanisms, and education plans? 4. (10 Min) The online speakers will share their respective perspectives. The speech topics include but are not limited to: (1) In what ways can emerging technologies protect children from cyberbullying? (2) How to reasonably regulate the use of emerging technologies to ensure children's online safety from different aspects such as policy and governance architecture, judicial capacity building, reporting and referral mechanisms, and education plans? 5. (5 Min) The invited speakers will share typical cases of emerging technologies in protecting children's online safety. 6. (8 Min) Open discussion and Q&A: all participants onsite and online will have the opportunity to ask questions and discuss their viewpoints, and speakers will answer these questions. 7. (5 Min) The chief child protection of the UNICEF will give a concluding speech. 8. (2 Min) The moderator will deliver the closing remarks.
(1) As a hybrid forum, there are both onsite speakers and attendees, as well as online speakers and attendees. In order to attract more attendees, we will invite and encourage people to participate online through Zoom meeting software. The onsite and online moderators will closely cooperate and be responsible for activating the atmosphere of onsite and online discussions, respectively. The online moderator will collect online questions in a timely manner and convey them to the onsite moderator to ensure smooth communication between the onsite and online attendees. (2) Multiple volunteers will be arranged onsite for video filming to ensure that each speaker's speech video can be live streamed online through Zoom. The moderator and speakers onsite can see the online participants' questions in real-time through the LED screen on site. The online moderator interacts with online attendees, promptly pushing meaningful questions through the screen to the moderator or speakers onsite, and strictly controlling the speaking time to ensure the participation of each speaker and the progress of the forum. In addition, we will promote the forum in advance so that online participants can prepare questions and relevant materials in advance, which may facilitate more interesting discussions onsite. (3) The organizer will design and create graphic and textual links, promotional posters, etc. around the theme of the forum, and spread them through social media platforms such as WeChat, Twitter, and Facebook to attract more attendees and stimulate everyone's thinking in advance, creating an atmosphere of joint participation.
🔒UNICEF China
Organizer 1: Rui Li, UNICEF China, Intergovernmental Organization Organizer 2: Shenrui Li, UNICEF China, Intergovernmental Organization Organizer 3: Xiuyun Ding, China Federation of Internet Societies, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group Organizer 4: Yiran Xing, China Federation of Internet Societies, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group Organizer 5: Ming Yan, Communication University of China, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group Organizer 6: Rui Xiong, Communication University of China, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group (Online) Organizer 7: Zhe Li, Osaka University, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group
1.Ren Xianliang, World Internet Conference, China Federation of Internet Societies, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group 2.Li Zengrui, Communication University of China, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group 3.Patrick Burton, UNICEF, Intergovernmental Organization(online) 4. Sun Yi, Kobe Institute of Computing Graduate School of Information Technology, Civil Society, Asia-Pacific Group 5.Wang Mengyin, Tencent, Private sector, Asia-Pacific Group 5. Masasi Bakari Hassan, Star Times, Private sector(online) 6. Dora Giusti, UNICEF China, Intergovernmental Organization
Shenrui Li, UNICEF China
Xiuyun Ding, China Federation of Internet Societies
Ming Yan, Communication University of China
Targets: First, online trolling, online sexual exploitation and abuse are by-products of the information age and a new form of violence, which is common in daily life. The harm caused by words and language in cyberspace is different from the physical violence in reality. Online trolling, online sexual exploitation and abuse do not directly cause physical pain, but can cause a huge psychological blow to people, and even more people cannot withstand the pressure of online violence and public opinion, leading to extreme behavior. Applying emerging technologies to prevent online violence and identify pornographic content will help reduce online trolling, online sexual exploitation and abuse from a technical perspective. (SDG16.1) Second, online protection for children is the fundamental means to prevent them from being subjected to online bullying, privacy breaches, online sexual exploitation and abuse in the online world. This forum focuses on the application scenarios and typical cases of emerging technologies in children's online safety. On the basis of ensuring the online rights of children, it explores how to protect them from various forms of online violence mentioned above, which will help promote consensus among countries on the protection of children's online safety. (SDG16.2) Finally, the forum mainly discusses the role of emerging technologies in children's online protection, emphasizing the parallel governance of minors' online rights and online protection. The rights of minors to development, participation, and protection are fundamental human rights, as well as fundamental rights to ensure public access to information and protect fundamental freedoms. (SDG16.10)
Report
Different from traditional Internet applications, the Internet applications driven by emerging technologies introduce intelligent technologies. The use of these technologies helps to provide more well-being for children, such as health monitoring of children, recommendation of quality content, company of special groups, etc. However, emerging technologies also bring many risks to children, such as unfairness and data privacy security.
Immersive digital spaces (virtual environments that create a sense of presence or immersion for users), facilitated by AI may inadvertently expose children to environments not designed for them, amplifying the risks of sexual grooming and exploitation. As technology evolves, immersive digital spaces can become more widespread in all fields. Therefore, there is a need to further understand the implications on and risjs for children.
It is recommended that the United Nations analyse the development of standards and regulations for the assessment of emerging technologies in the area of children, share knowledge and best practices, and provide a platform for multi-stakeholder exchanges on how to develop common principles for the emerging technologies that we want and to ensure that we have the right institutions in place to translate them into binding standards and regulations.
It is suggested that the international community strengthen dialogue and cooperation based on mutual respect and trust. We could not tackle difficult issues such as illegal industries targeting children and hidden cyber threats without collaboration across regions and platforms. Together, we can build a community with a shared future in cyberspace that fosters the healthy growth of children.
Open Forum #15, "Protecting Children Online with Emerging Technologies ", aims to explore how to rationalize the use of emerging technologies to prevent and respond to various forms of safety issues encountered by children when they are online, as well as to explore in-depth ways to support the development of broader policies and interventions to keep children safe online and to explore the availability of specific action plans.
The forum invites representative panelists from government agencies, social organizations, universities and institutes enterprises and other aspects, to participate in the speech. Experienced moderator was selected to summarize and comment on each guest's point of view in a timely manner, so that the entire forum activities are rich in content, in-depth, and tightly focused on the theme, and resonate with the thoughts of the participants with a good authority and vivid expressive power.
Panelists conducted in-depth discussions on the development of broader policies and interventions to protect children's online safety, focusing on how to make good use of the Internet and other emerging technologies, so that information technology can maximize data integration and utilization, while maximizing the protection of children's rights and safety on the Internet. Speakers from the management, technology and other perspectives to talk more about methods and measures, more introduction of practice cases, exchange and share the international and domestic innovations in recent years, aimed at providing a series of solutions for children's online protection, with easy-to-understand knowledge propaganda, vivid and lively case introduction, to enhance the attractiveness of the forum activities.
Participating guests agreed that the Open Forum provides reference for countries to formulate protection policies and contributes useful inspiration to promote the protection of children's online safety globally and provide a healthy online environment. More than 100 guests from government departments, social organizations, universities and research institutions, news media, Internet companies and other online and offline to participate in the forum.
Although the forum was not able to hold a Q&A session on site due to time constraints, ,but after the meeting, the speakers had a fuller exchange with the audience, focusing on how to make better use of Internet technologies, especially generative artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies. They conducted in-depth discussions and exchanges on specific policy measures developed and implemented by various countries, such as setting up a youth mode in smartphones, applying emerging technologies to online content auditing so as to accurately identify content that infringes on children's privacy and filter the dissemination of inappropriate content for children, and setting up a mechanism for reporting and handling reports.