Youth Protection on Student Laptops is Being Expanded

Since 2020, over 600,000 children in Austria in the first year of middle school and lower secondary school have received affordable laptops or tablets through their schools. However, they were only protected from inappropriate content on the internet when the devices were used within the school network. This is set to change in the spring: In the future, youth protection filters will operate directly on the computer, independent of the Wi-Fi or router used. Parents can set up additional blocks.

Through a security configuration centrally provided by the Ministry of Education, which will be largely automated and transferred to the children's devices by the schools from the end of March, websites with radical, disturbing, sexist, or pornographic content will be blocked in the web browser—even if children connect to the internet via Wi-Fi in a train or fast-food restaurant. Schools are legally obliged to implement youth protection. If necessary, network administrators can adapt the ministry's script to the needs of their respective school or even program their own solution. From April, the new model is expected to be implemented across all student computers.

"Basic Protection" for All, Parents Can Be Stricter

All parents will be able to rely on a "basic protection" in the future, explained Martin Bauer, Chief Digital Officer at the Ministry of Education, in an interview with APA. Although parents could theoretically already install filter software on the computers, for which they pay 25 percent of the cost and which become the property of the children, many are technically overwhelmed by this, and such products often cost money. Additionally, there have been practical issues when protection software installed on student laptops conflicted with other programs.

Sometimes, even schoolwork could not be conducted because children were unable to use the computer due to a screen time restriction during the schoolwork, and parents were unreachable to unlock it. Previously, the school could not access the student laptop in such cases, even though they are legally obliged to manage the devices.

In the future, this should no longer happen, as the new model keeps the basic management with the school. Parents will additionally receive local administrator rights and can further restrict screen time through appropriate programs. For the installation of private applications, such as games, parents must give consent with their local administrator account. According to Bauer, schools will provide recommendations for solutions that do not lead to unwanted interactions.

Parents Should Accompany Children in Usage

If parental management still causes complications, the computer can be unlocked in the future using the school administrator password or, in an emergency—such as if parents forget their password—can even be completely reset to the start state. For parents who find the web filter proposed by the ministry too intrusive due to privacy concerns, there is an opt-out solution.

However, Bauer emphasized that he would not rely solely on technical solutions for youth protection. Children and adolescents will always find ways to bypass technical blocks. He advocates for setting rules with the children and actively accompanying the child in using the laptop, for example, by regularly checking the browser history to see which sites the child has visited. In the subject of Digital Basic Education, children will also learn how to handle devices and applications.

(APA/Red)

This article has been automatically translated, read the original article here.