Westcoastcloud responds to parliamentary inquiry into online child protection

UK internet security software provider Westcoastcloud has stepped up its call for the BSI Kitemark for Child Online Safety to be better promoted by Government after a cross-parliamentary committee concluded that more needs to be done to prevent children from accessing pornography and websites showing extreme violence.

The committee report is available at: http://www.claireperry.org.uk/downloads/independent-parliamentary-inquiry-into-online-child-protection.pdf

Netintelligence is the security and parental controls software provided by the Post Office to customers subscribing to its Broadband Extra service. It is also used by parents and schools across the UK to filter and block unsuitable and inappropriate websites. Netintelligence can be used to protect children across all internet-connected devices including mobile phones and tablets.

Bill Strain, director of Westcoastcloud, said: “Just over a year ago we were presented with the newly-created Kitemark for Child Online Safety by Children and Families Minister Tim Loughton and yet since then nothing has been done to recommend this as an industry standard. Many parents are confused about what software they can use to protect their children from accessing adult material online. A proper standard like the Kitemark would at least give them a benchmark by which to judge parental controls software.”

Bill Strain added: “The point about parental controls software like Netintelligence is that it does not block the adult content per se. Filtering and blocking can be implemented for each inter-connected device so allowing different policies to be set according to the age and interests of the individual user. It is not censoring by default.”

A survey carried out by Westcoastcloud for UK safer Internet Day back in February revealed that parents in Scotland were concerned about the online safety of their children. Yet it showed that only 1 in 4 had installed protection on the mobile phones, games consoles and television services their children used in the home.

Bill Strain added: “Our survey showed that parents are still failing to recognise that in our increasingly mobile world, the same level of protection needs to be provided when their children are accessing the internet via their mobile phones, the television and while they’re gaming. Parents are worried about the explicit and sexual content their children can access on the internet and they do need think about protecting across every internet-connected device in the home.”

Westcoastcloud is headquartered in Glasgow and is a subsidiary of iomart Group plc which is one of the UK’s leading cloud computing and managed hosting companies.

For more information about Westcoastcloud visit www.westcoastcloud.com