On November 22, the Russian Civic Chamber held a regular meeting of the Working Group on Children’s Information Security of the Public Council under the Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights.  Representatives of the Smart Internet Foundation and the registry for the .ДЕТИ domain were among those invited to take part in the meeting.

Items on the meeting agenda:

1. Getting youth involved in educational and outreach activities aimed to ensure information security.

2. Discussing the Explanatory Note to fully resume the work for the adoption of the legislative initiative on extending the requirements of the federal law On the Protection of Children from Information Harmful to their Health and Development.

3. Forming a network of trusted experts who will provide psychological assistance for victims of information threats

4. Discussing the Working Group’s plans for 2019, and more.

Regarding the first item, the meeting participants discussed recommendations for getting minors and youth involved in educational and outreach activities aimed to ensure digital security. They outlined as key points the need to engage youth in the work on a permanent basis; to regularly raise the awareness of youth activists; and to enhance the efficiency of cooperation with young activists for the benefit of the internet industry, which is going to get an editorial focus group to test decisions and educational materials. The recommendations also list a number of restrictions to the projects being implemented, including those dealing with politicization and involving minors and youth in the search for and analysis of potentially unlawful content.

Regarding the second issue, the meeting participants stated that any attempt to develop mechanisms protecting those under the legal age from the impact of negative information is facing the same challenge – the absence of real mechanisms for classifying content, and, as a consequence, of controlling its online circulation. In effect, this hurdle thwarts the implementation of any relevant initiatives coming not only from the public but from federal executive agencies as well. Thus, expanding the regulatory requirements to include classifying online content will make it possible to implement initiatives to coordinate labelling with software and hardware protection tools, to protect children from age-inappropriate ads and to further improve the age classification system. The above-mentioned ideas formed the basic version of the Explanatory Note.

As for the fourth item, the Working Group came forward with a number of proposals for the 2019 Action Plan that envisages both continuing work on a number of issues addressed in 2018 and tackling new challenges brought about by the technological progress of the information environment – in the first place, by the internet of things and synthesized video.