Recent years have seen a vast increase in access to and use of the Internet. Children and teenagers are one of the fastest growing groups of Internet users. Using modern information technologies, the youth generation is believed to be the most informed generation in the whole history of the mankind. The youth consumers do not ask, they just know everything about a desired product or service. On one hand this is panacea for the consumer protection and awareness issues. On the other hand, more and more children are using information technologies and the age of the youngest users drops dramatically every year. Now a day it is normal to see a 5 year old child exploring the Internet pages and this trend is expected to continue. The problem of youth internet victimization and its prevention rises as crucial issue in the years of information society building. It is extremely important that parents, law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and victim service providers to know as much as possible about Internet crimes against children so they could act appropriately and to prevent children from internet victimization and frauds.

Traditionally, both intrafamilial offenders and strangers have found that youth are perfect targets for criminal acts because they are naive and curious, and eager for attention. The danger to children is even greater because the Internet provides some level of anonymity to offenders. Whether the victimization occurs in person or over the Internet, the process is not different - the offender uses information to target a child victim. The offender wants to build the child’s trust, which will allow him to get what he or she ultimately wants from the child.

Although no family is immune to the possibility that their child may be exploited and harassed on the Internet, a few factors make some children more vulnerable than others. Older children tend to be at greater risk because they often use the computer unsupervised and are more likely to engage in online discussions of a personal nature. Some victims become unwitting participants as they actively participate in instant messaging with strangers, chat rooms, send own pictures, or disseminate personal information online. Troubled or rebellious teens who are seeking emancipation from parental authority can be susceptible to Internet offenders. The risk of victimization is greater for emotionally vulnerable youth who may be dealing with issues of sexual identity or family issues. These young people may be willing to engage in conversation that is exciting but appears innocent and harmless. Unfortunately, Internet interactions that initially appear innocent can gradually lead to sexually explicit conduct.

There are several issues, other than sexual, which are important and well known in the Internet. One of them is “ANA” issue – there are many sites, rooms, clubs, which have made a cult of as a serious medical condition as Anorexia nervosa (a.k.a. ANA). The content is structured in the way that an innocent child could be misinformed for this deadly mental condition.

The second major issue is neo-fascism issue. There are several very powerful organizations in the world, spreading this kind of content in an enormous amount of websites, ftp-servers or chat-rooms. The web sites are mainly text oriented, and there are sites that could not be recognised as racism or “Nazi” related even from an adult. The “catch” is in the texts and stories on the sites, which is gently misinforming the youth about facts of history, organizations, ethical issues, etc, by simply mixing several true facts and one lie.

One major issue, which is extremely important to prevent children from interaction is so called, scarification or body modification content pages. These communities are hosted and supported by people who pretend to be in good mental health. Unfortunately they are offering to the children very dangerous, harmful and possibly deadly know-how. Several examples taken from described kind of sites, are the following: illustrated manual on how to become eunuch; own limb amputation; supporting one’s flesh from irritating, when skin is removed (without reasonable, valid or medical reason!); testicles or penis removal or modification. These sites are often hidden under the tattoo/piercing-mania that is well spread all over the world in the recent days. There are several sites that offers free of charge CDs with vast amount of pictures and films on these subjects.

The last shocking example, concerning Internet safety issues is connected with mass spreading terrorism psychosis. There are enormous sites, torrents, peer-to-peer networks and private servers that offer know-how for becoming a terrorist; preparing a bomb at home, or movies showing killings in particularly repulsive manner in details.

Another, very important issue to be tackled while the risks generated by Internet are discussed, concerns dangers to consumer interest of young Internet users.

E-shopping is more popular among children and teenagers than among adults, young consumers buy in Internet a lot of products. The ten most frequent fraud reports involve undelivered Internet and online services; damaged , defective, misrepresented or undelivered merchandise; auction sales; pyramid schemes and multilevel marketing; misrepresented cyberspace business opportunities and franchises; work-at-home schemes; prizes and sweepstakes; credit card offers; books and other self-help guides; and magazine subscriptions. During completing the contract they provide a lot of personal data to the sellers, mostly not just of themselves but also of their parents or other family members. To finalise the transaction children often use their parents’ credit card. That might result in serious infringements of their economic and other interest.

Pitfalls of particular dangers are dialers which are installed in more and more web pages. This is a specific type of adaware, which once allowed entering the computer, generates traffic or extra impulses to the phone bill. While being trapped, young Internet users, spending hours in front of computers are not aware that they are to pay additional money for any single second they use Internet.

Other popular malicious software is the so called “Trojan Horse”. It is type of spyware, which exists in many modifications and can generate great risks for the economic interests of the consumers. Children are more trustful, and often explore unsafe web pages, or open e-mails from strangers.  If a program of this type is once allowed to enter the computer it is capable of collecting all kinds of confidential information, such as passwords, or credit card codes, and transfers them to unscrupulous people.

Another type of violation of the consumers’ interests through the internet includes the Spam. Spam is e-mail massage, usually containing advertising text, which the consumer receives, without giving his permission for that, or having any use of it. Receiving Spam is a problem, because it leads to direct and indirect costs, like lost of time or extra money for phone bills.

Characteristics of the internet crimes:

Several characteristics distinguish Internet crimes from other crimes committed against children:

• Physical contact between the child and the perpetrator does not need to occur for a child to become a victim or for a crime to be committed. Innocent pictures or images of children can be digitally transformed into pornographic material and distributed across the Internet without the victims’ knowledge. Often absolutely innocent child pictures or family photos are displayed by offenders in wrong context, thus victimizing the child.
• The Internet provides a source for repeated, long-term victimization of a child that can last for years, often without the victim’s knowledge. Once a child’s picture is displayed on the Internet, it can remain there forever. Images can stay on the Internet indefinitely without damage to the quality of the image.
• These crimes transcend jurisdictional boundaries, often involving multiple victims from different communities, states, and countries. The geographic location of a child is not a primary concern for perpetrators who target victims over the Internet. Often, perpetrators travel hundreds of miles to different states and countries to engage in sexual acts with children they met over the Internet. Many of these cases involve local, state, federal, and international law enforcement entities in multiple jurisdictions.
• Many victims of Internet crimes do not disclose their victimization or even realize that they have been victims of a crime. Whereas children who experience physical or sexual abuse may disclose the abuse to a friend, teacher, or parent, many victims of Internet crimes remain anonymous until pictures or images are discovered by law enforcement during an investigation. The presumed anonymity of Internet activities often provides a false sense of security and secrecy for both the perpetrator and the victim.

When we talk about violation of economic interests of the consumers, the internet crimes are hard to uncover. The companies that provide services and products online are hard to find and often don’t even exist. In many cases the office of the company is situated in country, different from the country of the consumer. This requires involvement of state and international bodies, which takes a lot of time and efforts. In many cases the consumers give up their claims, and fraudulent companies continue to exist undisturbed on the internet.  

BENEFICIARIES

DIRECT BENEFICIARIES

The Strategy is aimed at adults living / working in local communities, those having impact on education and bringing up processes directed to children and young people.

The group of beneficiaries consists of parents (and foster-parents), teachers and other educators; in case of Poland - local consumer advocates are to be taken into account.

Parents and teachers play a crucial role in both education and protection of children, including all possible cases related to the usage of Internet. However, they have to realize that children are often better with computers than them. When going on-line, children reach the outside world, which should be available for adults, if they want to have a control on children safety.

It is the main reason for adults to look for more knowledge, skills and information concerning Internet safety; it is the main reason for focusing this Strategy on adults.

There are several techniques and instruments which might be effectively used by parents. There are also measures available for teachers to be used in the school and post school education process.

In case of Poland, the unique position of the local consumer advocates should be stressed as this is a group of consumer advisers participating in the education of young consumers.

INDIRECT BENEFICIARIES

All activities provided by the Strategy aim at improving safety of young consumers using Internet. Children and youth are indirect beneficiaries of the presented Strategy.

Parents, teachers, local consumer advocates after being prepared to educate children on how go on-line safety, will multiply results of the Strategy implementation by distributing their knowledge in every day process of home and school education.   

Strategy Aim: Raising internet safety of children in the target countries

Specific aim 1: Raising awareness of internet generated risks
        Objective: Majority of parents to be able to identify Internet generated risks till the end of 2007.
        Activity: Preparation of informational brochures, specifically directed toward parents
        Activity: Realization of information campaign in cooperation with schools 
        Activity: Internet and paper based publications in magazines, whose main auditory are parents
        Objective: Achieve 15% national awareness of the problem
        Activity: Conduction of sociological survey for identification of the common and specific needs of the participating countries.
        Activity: Internet and media publications, as well as preparation of informational brochures, directed toward the general public
        Activity: Initiation of wide public discussion, concerning risks for the children online
        Activity: Creation of Internet forum 

Specific aim 2: Raising parents’ capability of child protection from the Internet generated risks
    Objective: Creation of possibilities for obtaining informal education
        Activity: Publishing of online informational and educational materials in the native languages of the participating countries.
        Activity: Organization of educational activities for parents- seminars, courses etc.

    Objective: Raising activism of parents, looking for information and education 
        Activity: Establishment of media rubrics, concerning the Internet generated risks. 
        Activity: Providing information for the current possibilities throughout own informational sources- bulletins, web-pages etc.

Objective: Development of instruments for online child protection
        Activity: Campaigning among the home Internet providers for the provision of filtered Internet services
Activity: Adaptation of open source filter software for children protection
        Activity: Popularization in the participating countries, of the widely used across Europe   ICRA -voluntary self-labeling system
        Activity: Development of system for webpage labeling, applicable in the native languages of the countries involved and creation of data base with safe internet sites

Specific aim 3: Building institutional capacity for parens education.
    Objective: Training of trainers
        Activity: Development of educational modules, in accordance with previously identified problems and needs
        Activity: Practical implementation of the developed modules
   
Objective: Establishment of cooperation with schools       
        Activity: Development of training modules for teachers
        Activity: Organizing trainings for schoolteachers and publications in magazines whose main auditory are educators
        Activity: Provide Information for schools

    Objective: Cooperation with state bodies and international organizations
        Activity: Signing cooperation agreement with the state bodies responsible for the child protection
        Activity: Partnership/membership in international organization, with rich experience, dealing with similar type of problems.
        Activity: Active exchange of good practices among partners and organizations with greater experience in the field.