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McAfee launches Online Safety Programme for children across Ireland

Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Children & Youth Affairs Minister Frances Fitzgerald with McAfee President Mike DeCesare, Paul Walsh, VP of Engineering at McAfee Ireland, Gert-Jan Schenk, President, McAfee EMEA, Janel Van der Goudenhaart, Gouda Rasisyte, Safiya Gopee and Mary Kate Downes from Scoil Chaitriona National School, Baggot Street, and Transition Year students Niamh Lane and Conor McGrath from Cross & Passion College, Kilcullen, Co. Kildare

Taoiseach Enda Kenny and Children &Youth Affairs Minister Frances Fitzgerald with McAfee President Mike DeCesare, Paul Walsh, VP of Engineering at McAfee Ireland, Gert-Jan Schenk, President, McAfee EMEA, Janel Van der Goudenhaart, Gouda Rasisyte, Safiya Gopee and Mary Kate Downes from Scoil Chaitriona National School, Baggot Street, and Transition Year students Niamh Lane and Conor McGrath from Cross & Passion College, Kilcullen, Co. Kildare

Taoiseach Enda Kenny today welcomed the launch by McAfee of its Online Safety for Kids programme in Ireland.

As part of the launch, McAfee also released results from its ‘Digital Divide’ Study, an Irish study that looks at how teens are keeping their parents in the dark about what they’re doing online.

Some of the findings were:

  • Disturbingly, more than one in 10 (11 per cent) said they had actually met up with someone they met online
  • A third of teens (33 per cent) have looked up answers to a test/assignment online
  • Just over a third (34 per cent) have looked up simulated violence online
  • One in 10 teens admitted to having posted revealing pictures of themselves online, with 12 per cent posting a comment containing foul language online with the same amount regretting it later

The full findings can be viewed here.

MerrionStreet.ie talked to two students at the launch of the Programme about internet safety. Watch the video below...

 

 

According to the Digital Divide study, more than half of the Irish teens surveyed admitted to wiping their browser history to hide what they’re doing online from their parents.

The Taoiseach said:

I commend McAfee for launching this national online safety initiative, which will be of interest to many parents and young people. The results of the Digital Divide survey will be a cause for concern among some parents but information and education are the way forward. Technology has enhanced all of our lives and continues to do so, and it is also a key building block in our country's economic recovery and the future of our children. However, their safety is all-important and raising awareness and skill levels through initiatives like the one being undertaken by McAfee are essential.