Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on "A programme for child protection on the Internet"
Date: 2001-11-28
Institutions: European Economic and Social Committee
Subjects: Europol, Internet, child protection, gaming, paedophilia, violence

21.2.2002

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Official Journal of the European Communities

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Opinion of the Economic and Social Committee on ‘A programme for child protection on the
Internet’

(2002/C 48/06)

On 28 February 2001 the Economic and Social Committee, acting under the second paragraph of Rule 23
of its Rules of Procedure, decided to draw up an opinion on ‘A programme for child protection on the
Internet’.

The Section for Transport, Energy, Infrastructure and the Information Society, which was responsible for
preparing the Committee’s work on the subject, adopted its opinion on 6 November 2001. The
rapporteur was Mrs Davison.

At its 386th plenary session on 28 and 29 November 2001 (meeting of 28 November), the Economic
and Social Committee adopted the following opinion by 112 votes for with three abstentions.

1.

Introduction

1.1.
The Economic and Social Committee has produced
several opinions which refer to the need for child protection
on the Internet. Since the first was produced in 1997, with
Dame Jocelyn Barrow as rapporteur, Internet use in many
countries of Europe has expanded enormously with around
100 million people now on-line (1). The potential for exposure
to harmful content is expanding along with the obvious
benefits of the Internet. Besides the illegal use of the Internet
for distribution of child pornography, Europe is beginning to
follow the US in seeing its own cases of both attempted and
actual child abduction by paedophiles using the Internet for
their approach.

1.2.
The Committee is therefore calling on all players,
government, the Internet industry, educational authorities, the
content providers, parents associations and the user groups
working with parents to make the strenuous efforts required
to provide effective child protection and to provide plenty of
positive sites for children. Its initiative for child protection on
the Internet is offered here to complement and strengthen the
EU Internet Action Plan (IAP) and raise the profile of such
action with the Committee’s constituent groups, the socio-
economic interest groups.

1.3.
The Internet has great benefits for children; they use it
for communication, entertainment, education and infor-
mation. However, as it expands in Europe, problems experi-
enced in the US are beginning to be seen here too throughout
the EU. Paedophiles have been posing as children in the
anonymity of the Internet and managing to arrange face-to-
face meetings, which have several times ended in rape. Chat
rooms are often the medium used by paedophiles for their line
of approach. Recent prosecutions of child pornography ring
led by Sweden, have highlighted
members across Europe,
the new opportunities for online abuse. Police report that

(1) NUA Internet Surveys (http://www.nua/ie).

thousands of children are being abused for photos and videos
to be shown on-line. And, apart from criminal activity, surveys
of children, indeed even a few minutes of casual surfing, reveal
easy access to harmful content (2).

1.4.
Pornography: An estimated 30 % of visits and about
50-60 000 sites concern pornography. Those who distribute
soft pornography often do not want to aim it at children —
indeed, children are not good customers since they cannot
pay, but access is extremely easy.

Some pornographic sites are charged at premium
1.4.1.
rates and only include warnings which children are likely to
ignore. In some countries, but not all, telephone companies
write to warn the subscriber of heavy bills. Even then, bills
may already have exceeded EUR 200.

Gambling: There is little evidence of regulation of
1.5.
gambling on the Internet, although some countries, like France,
do not permit citizen gambling for money on the Internet.
Many sites have no age restriction and offer gambling for fun
or for money. Once the surfer has visited gambling sites,
banner ads for others appear on the screen. Research in Greece
has, revealed gambling by children using their parents’ credit
cards and Austrian and UK research has revealed concern
about gambling on the net to be a major issue among children
themselves (3).

(2) For example, in July 1999 one in five children said they came
across upsetting information and told nobody because they did
not want to lose access to the Internet.

(3) Research under the EU Internet Action Plan, conducted by
European Research into Consumer Affairs, E.KAT.O, Greece and
LAK, Austria (see Appendix 3).

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1.6.
Violence: Two authoritative US reports have examined
1 000 pieces of research from a span of over 30 years and
have concluded that children are adversely affected by violence
in the media in relation to aggressiveness, desensitisation and
fearfulness. The majority of these studies reach the same
conclusion, say the reports, that media violence leads to
real-world violence (1). Racism and xenophobia — refer to
Cybercrime Opinion (2).

and for the practical reason that concerns over harmful and
illegal content on the Internet is shown by a number of surveys
to be deterring consumers from using the Internet. In its
Opinion on the Protection of Minors and Human Dignity
in Audiovisual and Information Services in 1998 (4),
the
Committee expressed its concern that ‘lack of protection for
minors from illegal and harmful content’ was deterring use of
the Internet (5).

1.6.1.
Yet via the Internet, children can access violent
computer games and videos without their parents realising.
One Internet site shows photos of real murder and suicide
victims. This has been ruled perfectly legal by Finnish courts.
A white supremacist site offers a children’s web page and a
football hooligans’ site arranges opportunities for fights.

There are also some problems with tobacco and

1.7.
alcohol promotion to children on the Internet.

In its 1997 Opinion on the Green Paper on the
2.3.
Protection of Minors and Human Dignity in Audiovisual and
Information Services (6), the Committee proposed ‘some form
of European-wide self-regulatory body should be established
which would be overseen/governed by an international body.
This self-regulatory body should be responsible for dealing
with complaints about illegal and/or harmful content and for
tracing offender, for requesting the removal of offending
content and if offenders do not co-operate, for taking action
against the offenders themselves’.

2. The Committee’s previous opinions

— use of rating systems and filtering software;

2.4.

In 1998 the ESC called for:

The Committee supports as broad as possible access to
2.1.
the Internet and education on its use.
In its opinion on
e-Europe: an Information Society for All of 24 January 2001 (3)
the Committee concluded that ‘not a single European citizen,
regardless of the level of schooling reached, or company of
any size, should be able to deny having had the opportunity
or the possibility to acquaint themselves with the information
society’. It asked for modernisation of schools to embrace the
new medium and for help for regions lagging behind.

2.2.
The ESC believes that Internet regulation should be
sensitive, proportionate and non-discriminatory and impinge
as little as possible on the principles of privacy and free speech.
However, it believes that some regulation is necessary because
of the need to protect minors, women and ethnic minorities,

(1) American Academy of Paediatrics, American Psychiatric Associ-
ation, American Psychological Association, American Medical
Association and American Academy of Child and Adolescent
Psychiatry,
Joint Statement on the Impact of Entertainment
Violence on Children, Congressional Public Health Summit, July
26, 2000 and Children, Violence and the Media; A Report for
Parents and Policy Makers; Senate Committee on the Judiciary;
Senator Orrin G. Hatch; Utah; Chairman; Committee on the
Judiciary Prepared by Majority Staff Senate Committee on the
Judiciary September 14, 1999.

(2) OJ C 311, 7.11.2001.
(3) OJ C 123, 25.4.2001, p. 36.

— educational and awareness-raising initiatives;

— a European (or even internationally accepted) framework
of codes of conduct, guidelines and grass-roots measures
such as ‘hot-lines’ and youth protection officers.

2.5.
After these opinions, the EU adopted a Safer Internet
Action Plan, reflecting these ideas. Nonetheless, most recently
in its Opinion on ‘Principles and Guidelines for the Com-
munity’s audiovisual policy in the digital age (7)’, the Committee
considered that protection of minors is becoming more
difficult to achieve in the digital era and therefore a stricter
approach to standards and mechanisms should be adopted,
for example:

— it would be possible to place child-protection mechanisms
in television sets and computers which allow the highest
level of protection. At the same time, the protection
mechanisms could be removed or reduced to suit individ-
ual circumstances;

(4) OJ C 214, 10.7.1998, p. 25.
(5) A British survey found 70 % of parents ‘horrified’ at the prospect
of their children viewing ‘undesirable content on-line’ NOP July
2000.

(6) OJ C 287, 22.9.1997, p. 11.
(7) OJ C 116, 20.4.2001, p. 30.

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— information on child/human dignity and protection sys-
tems and rating should be available on Internet pages,
leaflets and mouse pads at point of sale;

— Facilitating international agreement on rating sys-

tems.

— compulsory rating of programming/content;

— the use of domain names to extend the film-rating system

to the Internet;

— Encouraging awareness actions

— Preparing the ground for awareness actions.

— Encouraging implementation of full-scale awareness

actions.

— in a positive and pro-active direction, quality and attract-
ive programming like the German ‘Kinder Kanal sets a
good example.’

— Support actions

2.6.
The Committee’s Opinion on Combating Computer
Crime (1) argued against anonymity on the Internet and asked
for an international management body for the Internet with
extensive public authority involvement.

3. The EU Safer Internet Action Plan (2)

3.1.
On 25 January 1999 the Commission adopted a
Multiannual Community Action Plan on promoting safer use
of the Internet by combating illegal and harmful content on
global networks, partly in response to the Committee’s work.

3.2.

The Safer Internet Action Plan has four action lines:

— Creating a safer environment

— Creating a European network of hot-lines for con-
sumers to report any suspicion of child por-
nography (3).

— Encouraging self-regulation and codes of conduct.

— Assessing legal implications.

— Co-ordination with similar international initiatives.

— Evaluating the impact of Community measures.

3.3.
This broad approach has been endorsed by results of
a major study with academic experts undertaken by the
Bertelsmann Foundation.

its
The Internet Action Plan had an impact. For example,
hotlines helped to track down a paedophile ring. Hotlines to
which surfers are encouraged to report child pornography, or
related systems are now available in all Member States except
Greece and Portugal.

3.4.
Awareness-raising measures sponsored by the Safer
Internet Action Plan, to educate parents and children such as
the attached codes for parents and children are helping to
warn children against meeting ‘strangers’ from the Internet.
Filtering and rating mechanisms based on the Internet Content
Rating Association (ICRA) model have been made available
free to consumers.

— Developing filtering and rating systems

— Demonstrating the benefits of voluntary filtering

and rating such as ICRA.

3.5.
The plan has encouraged a range of filtering systems.
ICRA relies on website publishers deciding to self-rate their
site according to criteria on, for example, sex, nudity, gambling.
The criteria are based on global work done in the Platform for
Internet Content Selection (PIC).

(1) OJ C 311, 7.11.2001.
(2) http://europa.eu.int/ISPO/iap/index.html.
(3) Reports can be made to any of melding@stopline.at in Austria,
gpj@gpj.be in Belgium, redbarnet@redbarnet.dk in Denmark,
contact@afa-france.com in France, hotline@jugendschutz.net
or hotline@fsm.de in Germany, report@hotline.ie in Ireland,
crimino@unige.it in Italy, meldpunt@meldpunt.org in the Ne-
therlands, acpi@eresmas.net in Spain, rb-hotline@telia.com or
minor@press.rb.se in Sweden and report@iwf.org.uk in Britain.
Portugal has a website on www.pgr.pt/english/index.htm.

3.6.
The consumers decide themselves what kind of sites
they wish to avoid when they set up the system in their own
computer. The browser or other software then reads the labels
and closes access to those sites, unless a password is typed in.
Suppliers of operating systems or Internet connection software
should be encouraged to rapidly develop ‘smarter’, more
contextual filtering systems and integrate them into their
programmes. Such systems would not unnecessarily block
access to certain scientific sites or to encyclopaedias discussing,
for example, biological or sex education issues.

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3.7.
There are other systems which can be used. The
consumer may buy a software or ISP package which has
categorised web-sites for them or which uses trigger words or
pictures to dynamically analyse the contents of the web-site.
Software can record activity, including conversations in chat
rooms and can control children’s e-mail lists and prevent the
sending of certain information like credit card numbers.

3.8.
The advantage of the ICRA system is that, thanks to
the Internet Action Plan, it is available free to the consumer
and is already installed in the main browsers.

3.9.
None of these programmes can actually stop material
appearing on the Internet in the first place. All they do is
empower the individual end user to make choices about what
may or may not appear on their screens or their children’s
screens.

4. ESC proposals for a programme for child protection

on the Internet

4.1.
The almost universally accepted UN ‘Convention on
the Rights of the Child (1)’ refers to the need to ‘encourage the
development of appropriate guidelines for the protection of
the child from information and material injurious to his or her
well-being.’

4.2.

Illegal activity

Bringing child pornographers to justice is taking too
4.2.1.
long. The police are only managing to trace a tiny number of
the thousands of children whose images appear in on-line
abuse. They need sufficient staff, proper training in Internet
crime and effective international co-operation. Both Europol
and Interpol have to be strengthened. Hotlines need to be
firmly established in all Member States and given an advertising
budget commensurate with their vital role. Specialist police
units must be equipped with the most up-to-date and most
appropriate hard- and software for their investigations, so that
they are not working at a disadvantage.

4.2.2.
The distinction between privacy (for example the
right to restrict use of one’s financial data) and traceability is
likely to be redrawn after the attacks on the US Police access
to potentially suspicious on-line
(with due authorisation)

material would then be improved. Content providers should
register real world addresses and the use of blocked caller
identification on-line should be reconsidered.

In this context,

Existing laws need to be clarified and modernised to
4.2.3.
take account of crimes such as luring or tricking children into
meetings.
the Committee welcomes the
establishment of the European Forum on Cybercrime and
proposes that a similar forum or task force be set up to
examine the main problems relating to children on the Internet
(including harmful content) and how to tackle them in an
integrated fashion with the work on cybercrime.

4.2.4.
The Internet must not escape from the rule of law.
Criminal offences and penalties must be specific, and they
must be defined in a way which is accepted at European and,
as far as possible, world level. This irreplaceable means of
communication between individuals and cultures, of training
and education,
leisure and trade must remain an arena in
which freedom of expression, opinion, trade and industry, as
well as the confidentiality of correspondence and personal
privacy are safeguarded. Any measure which may restrict the
fundamental freedoms should be strictly proportionate and
justified on the grounds of protecting the broader interests of
society, such as the pursuit and arrest of natural or legal
persons who have committed criminal offences.

4.3. Awareness-raising

4.3.1.
Part of the solution is for parents to be more aware
of what their children can access on the Internet and to make
sensible rules. Parents take the main responsibility for their
children; this situation, however,
in that
children know so much more about the Internet than their
parents (and even their teachers) and the practical implications
of that knowledge is so far-reaching. For this reason the task
of educating parents and teachers needs to be taken very
seriously. Content providers also need to be aware that
children are generally alone when they use the net and to show
broadcaster responsibility.

is very unusual

(1) ‘Parties recognize the right of the child to be protected from
economic exploitation and from performing any work that is
likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education,
or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, spiritual, moral
or social development’. UN ‘Convention on the Rights of the
Child’, 1989, Art. 32.1.

The awareness-raising aspects of the Internet Action
4.3.2.
Plan are very important. In addition the EU should include this
in its planning on life-long learning, for example E Europe and
E learning. The Member States need to share best practice. For
example Portugal has a pilot programme of minibuses stocked
with computers visiting schools so that parents can be taught
Internet use by their children.

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Businesses,

trade unions,

4.3.3.
teacher, consumer and
family organisations can all help to educate children and
parents. The Committee would encourage parents and carers
to display rules, such as those annexed, by their computers.
ISPs should display them prominently from their home pages
and on mouse mats etc. Because of the cases of paedophile
stalking on the Internet, it is extremely important that children
learn not to arrange to meet anyone they come across first on
the Internet unless their parents are happy to come with them,
and in a public place.

4.4. Harmful content

4.4.1.
Since even a six-year old can now much more easily
see pornography, for example, it is all the more important to
define harmful content and provide protection (1).

4.4.2.
Some content is a particular danger to others if it
encourages violence or sexual or racial hatred. For example
racial supremacy sites even have special pages for children and
on-line advice on bomb-making and suicide has been reported.
The Committee would propose expanding the range of illegal
content. For example, France has banned racist sites. In its
Opinion on Cybercrime the Committee has called for the
approximation of laws and sanctions concerning combating
religions sects, racist ideas, sexism and, more generally, the
promotion of pornography and violence.

4.4.3.
The challenge is enforcement against sites set up on
the other side of the globe especially anonymous sites. The
French ban is being challenged in the US courts. A convention
or international agreement is needed that the law of the user
applies. In this respect, the Committee welcomes the work of
the Council of Europe.

illegal, content,

Regarding harmful, but not

4.4.4.
the
Committee supports a ‘notice and take-down’ policy combined
with more effective use of labelling and filtering schemes. A
standards body would receive complaints about sites, and, if it
ruled in their favour, would ask ISPs and search engines to
remove access in the same way that complaints against
offensive advertising are dealt with in some Member States.

4.4.6.
The EU should make a sustained and public effort to
have all content providers label their material, as a minimum
to the ICRA standard. Those who do not will and should be
frozen out of the market because they will not be picked up
by filtering systems. Any computers sold into the domestic
market should have child-safety software pre-installed and set
by default to a high level of security which the consumer can
reduce or uninstal. They should be accompanied by easy-to-
understand point of sale material explaining the basics of on-
line safety and of filtering and rating. A cheap and easy
opportunity to adopt such systems needs to be offered to
owners of older computers. Trust on-line schemes should
automatically require their members to rate their sites.

4.4.7. Whilst recognizing the nature of modern family,
parents need to supervise their children’s surfing when they
can. Especially they need to be helped to understand the
technical options to protect children from both harmful
material and stalking. These include ‘walled gardens’ (positive
lists of sites children can visit), negative lists which aim to
prevent access to the worst offenders and rating systems which
allow parents to set their own preferences. Surveys show the
limitations of current systems, and more work needs to be
done to make them effective and simple to use.

4.4.8.
There is also an overwhelming case for broad-
caster/ISP responsibility to support parents and protect those
children whose parents are unable to do so. Except for those
few ISPs specialising in an adult membership, ISPs should
advertise child-friendly search engines and signpost areas
especially for children. This best practice needs to be replicated.
In the new digital age we need to maintain the EU tradition of
public service broadcasting.

4.5.

Premium lines

4.4.5.
The Committee is disappointed with the small per-
centage of content on the Internet that has been labelled.
Voluntary efforts have fallen short and the need now is for
governments to intervene with a carrot and stick approach to
ensure the rapid expansion of rating.

(1) http://europa.eu.int/ISPO/iap/index.html.

Violent games and material should only be made available
when on a proven order from an adult and downloads
charged to premium lines should be avoided, unless there is
confirmation by adult signature. The US experience of requir-
ing confirmation from adults regarding on-line purchases
needs to be built upon. Telephone companies should, as in
France, urgently alert subscribers by post or by telephone, as
soon as unusually high charges appear on their accounts.

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4.6. Chat rooms

ISPs that allow children onto their networks at all
4.6.1.
and give access to Internet chat rooms or other chat channels
should also provide and promote the availability of moderated
chat aimed specifically at children. Chat-safety messages should
be prominently displayed close to or in chat areas and
mechanisms should exist which would allow suspicious behav-
iour towards children to be noted, reported and dealt with
very rapidly. Moderators need to be licensed in the same way
as other adults who supervise children.

4.6.2.
Current ISP procedures should be reviewed to include
wherever possible the recording and storing of chat-room
conversations, as is already the practice with premium-rate
the
telephone services,
participants. Costs can be kept low by using compression
software to increase capacity/storage space.

linked to the given identities of

4.7.

Sales promotion and advertising

The EU should ensure that on-line sales promotion does not
take advantage of children’s impulsiveness and inexperience.

Brussels, 28 November 2001.

Further, restrictions on tobacco and alcohol advertising need
to be properly enforced on-line.

5. Conclusions

5.1.
The Committee would emphasise the benefits of the
Internet for children and the need to transfer the culture of
public service broadcasting into the new media to create a
multiplicity of good material for children. At the same time
the prevalence of harmful content needs to be attacked with
new vigour.

5.2.
The Committee is concerned that police remain unable
to trace the majority of children abused for child pornography
on-line. It welcomes the intention of the Commission to
strengthen co-operation in this area. Europol and Interpol
especially need to be targeted.

5.3.
The Committee endorses the Internet Action Plan and
would strengthen it with more resources. However, the plan
does need to be backed up by legislation and new institutions
in some cases, and by vigorous action on the part of
governments, ISPs and the socio-economic interest groups.
The Committee does not accept that normal rules should be
abandoned in the new media environment.

The President

of the Economic and Social Committee

Göke FRERICHS