EC Statement: Digital Agenda survey highlights strengths and weaknesses of parental control programmes
( January 13, 2011, 11:33 GMT | Official Statement) -- MLex Summary: The European Commission has released the outcome of a study monitoring the effectiveness of parental control tools to block access to certain websites. The study highlighed the strengths of the initiative but emphasised that more was needed to increase awareness to parental controls and prevent the exposure of children to websites containing unsuitable material. Results from a study released today by the European Commission show that while a healthy 84% of the software programs tested enable parents to block access to certain websites, they are less efficient at filtering so-called web 2.0 content such as social networking sites or blogs. In addition, only a few products on the market are able to filter web content accessed via mobile phones or game consoles, at a time when one child out of four in Europe goes online in this way. In parallel, an EUKIdsOnline survey, also funded by the EU's Safer Internet Programme, found that only a quarter of EU parents use parental control software to monitor, track or filter what their children can do online. The publication of these surveys serves to raise awareness of the importance of protecting children from certain Internet content while giving parents an objective view of which parental control software is the most effective. The Commission is committed to helping parents and their children keep safe online as part of the Digital Agenda for Europe (see IP/10/581, MEMO/10/199 and MEMO/10/200)....
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