“Youth Safety on a Living Internet”: Report of the Online Safety and Technology Working Group

OSTWG_Final_Report_060410.pdf via kwout

The “Youth Safety on a Living Internet” report from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s  Online Safety and Working Technology Group, released Friday, June 4, advises that scare tactics related to online safety and blocked access to social networking sites is detrimental and does more harm than good to youth.   The findings of this report bolsters the efforts of librarians and educators to fight restrictive filtering policies that block students’ access to  content that can be used to help youth access, read, write, and interact with multiple forms of media via the web.

According to Larry Magid, Technology Journalist for the Huffington Post and member of this task force:

” What we concluded is that we need to go beyond worrying about predators and pornography and start thinking about young people as active participants – true citizens – in an increasingly interactive online environment where young people are just as likely to create content as they are to consume it.”