Child Safeguarding Through Online Safety Training

Anyone of any gender, age and background can experience abuse and with the rise of technology and the internet came a new threat: Online exploitation and abuse. Online abuse can come in many forms; like grooming, cyberbullying, online scams, sexual exploitation and the manipulation of others so they disclose personal information. M’lup Russey has been conducting skills training with young people who live in orphanages and careleavers for over a decade and has found that the lack or limitation of online safety lessons or the knowledge of how to report incidents makes children and young people vulnerable to this type of abuse.

In 2007, research by M'lup Russey's predecessor, ICC-Project SKY, found that the young people living in residential care faced issues regarding loneliness, their need for support to study and find jobs, their longing for warmth and closeness, and somebody who cares about them. In 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, M'lup Russey started to recognise that using social media and the internet was an emerging way to have these needs met. These feelings and needs all put them at high risk of being sexually exploited online. Random people they meet online who may become boyfriends or girlfriends, visitors to the places they live who took inappropriate photos and upload them to social media platforms, and former sponsors and voluntourists from when they were living in orphanages are all potential perpetrators. Most of the children and young people do not recognise the dangers of grooming encounters online, they see it as an opportunity to access the support they need and the warmth and closeness they long for. As they don't recognise the danger they are in, they do not disclose or report it.


M'lup Russey Social Workers have seen numerous examples of online exploitation of the young people they work with. In one case, while authorities were rescuing children and enforcing the closure of an orphanage after a police investigation into sexual abuse, a male foreign volunteer threw his personal IPad through the window of the van to a 12 year old girl as M'lup Russey was transporting the children to emergency foster placements, so that they could continue their relationship online. The IPad was passed to police as evidence.


In another case, a female careleaver was contacted online by a Malaysian recruiter who said she had the perfect job for a young Cambodian woman, and gave her instructions on how to access this 'wonderful' opportunity but without giving any details of the actual job. Thankfully, the Careleaver knew she could ask M'lup Russey for advice, and a serious trafficking situation was averted. This is an example of an online scam and how easyily people can get tricked into being trafficked.


And in a very recent conversation with careleavers, they disclosed that they had been approached online by men from the US who asked to have online relationships with them, as their boyfriends. This kind of situation often leads to online sexual exploitation, sexploitation, grooming and the invasion of personal privacy.


Many children and young people may not have been taught how to recognise the risks or dangers of the online world, which is why MRO works with youth club leaders and those in the Role Model programmes to educate and raise awareness amongst their peers to help them understand what risks they might face online. With this, children and youth are more likely to recognise potentially dangerous online situations and report it as well as maintaining their privacy online. This peer-to-peer support can be important, as not every young person has access to a trusted adult or is comfortable telling their guardians. MRO also works with caregivers from orphanages, church leaders and key community members to support and teach their children and youth about maintaining safety online. For children and youth to be safe and learn about the dangers, they must have good support systems in place to help them if something bad happens. MRO encourages both adults and youth to support people who may find themselves in uncomfortable or unsafe situations online and also provides training on how to report incidents if something happens to them.

Online safety training plays and active role in child safeguarding as the online world is now an integral part of almost every young person’s lives. Social media is a way to connect with others, but comes with risks if people aren’t careful. It is easy to make friends online, but it’s just as easy to fake an identity and exploit people from behind a screen. It is important that online safety is be taught in schools, to every age group, as younger children now also have often unrestricted and unsupervised access to the internet through handheld devices. Online safety shouldn’t be its own category anymore, it should be taught alongside sexual reproductive health and other such life skills training, as social media has now become an extension of our personal lives. Connecting these issues in education would prove beneficial to everyone, since the online landscape effects everyone who has access to the internet.

Online safety training is key to understanding dangers, recognising them, avoiding them and reporting them. M’lup Russey will ensure that our training evolves with these emerging issues and will continue to keep enabling the youth to have safe lives as adults in their communities.