RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

With more ac­cess to in­ter­net con­nec­tiv­i­ty, stu­dents are ex­posed, now more than ever, to in­ap­pro­pri­ate on­line ma­te­r­i­al in­clud­ing pornog­ra­phy, vi­o­lence and cy­ber­crimes.

Yet, in­ter­net ser­vice providers say they can­not to­tal­ly reg­u­late stu­dents’ ex­po­sure to in­ap­pro­pri­ate on­line ma­te­r­i­al un­less there is a clear man­date from Par­lia­ment.

Speak­ing at a Joint Se­lect Com­mit­tee So­cial Ser­vices and Pub­lic Ad­min­is­tra­tion meet­ing held to ad­dress hy­brid learn­ing, TSTT’s chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Lisa Agard said un­less there is a leg­isla­tive man­date from Par­lia­ment, they can­not re­strict ac­cess to in­ap­pro­pri­ate sites.

“We do not reg­u­late the in­ter­net. We can­not be the in­ter­net po­lice in the ab­sence of a clear leg­isla­tive man­date from the Par­lia­ment,” she said.

Ken­rick Gar­cia, TSTT’s chief tech­ni­cal of­fi­cer said some tech­ni­cal tools were avail­able to re­strict ac­cess but this has af­fect­ed cus­tomer sat­is­fac­tion.

 “We can ap­ply cer­tain fil­ters to the in­ter­net and block cer­tain types of traf­fic. How­ev­er, when we ap­ply these fil­ters, it is across the board and blocks every­one in the house­hold. So par­ents will not get ac­cess to cer­tain sites as well. Our cus­tomers have not been hap­py with that arrange­ment. It pro­tects the child but the par­ent can­not ac­cess the sites they would like,” he added.

Dig­i­cel’s chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Abra­ham Smith agreed that there should be some par­lia­men­tary reg­u­la­tions on in­ter­net con­trols.

“I agree holis­ti­cal­ly to solve the prob­lem there should be pol­i­cy and tech­ni­cal­ly we are ready to com­ply and work with what­ev­er pol­i­cy comes from that,” Smith said.

In the mean­time, Smith ex­plained that cer­tain tools have been made avail­able to par­ents to block in­ap­pro­pri­ate con­tent.

“We part­nered with T&T Cy­ber Crime Unit to do we­bi­na­rs to ed­u­cate fam­i­lies about on­line bul­ly­ing and safe on­line prac­tices. With our mo­bile ap­pli­ca­tions, we have Dig­i­cel’s Safe­ToNet that is safe­guard­ing chil­dren from bul­ly­ing, groom­ing, abuse and ag­gres­sion on­line. It pro­vides the abil­i­ty for par­ents to mon­i­tor con­trol and reg­u­late chil­dren’s ac­tiv­i­ties on­line,” Smith added.

He said, “ We re­cent­ly in­clud­ed parental con­trols in Wifi mesh and smart Wifi prod­ucts which are avail­able for home in­ter­net users which will al­low par­ents to re­strict cer­tain sites and im­ple­ment parental con­trols .”

Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Au­thor­i­ty of T&T (TATT) chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer Cyn­thia Red­dock Downes said stu­dents’ ex­po­sure to in­ap­pro­pri­ate con­tent was very im­por­tant.

She said TATT has em­barked on a pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion cam­paign that will alert par­ents to on­line reg­u­la­tions. She said there are on­go­ing dis­cus­sions about the mat­ter.