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Children should be better protected against exposure to online pornography, an independent panel of MPs has said
MPs call for online porn safeguards
Children should be better protected against exposure to online pornography, an independent panel of MPs has said.
The cross-party Independent Parliamentary Inquiry into Online Child Protection has been investigating the adequacy of existing national and global controls and computer filtering mechanisms that prevent children from accessing websites showing pornographic and violent material.
In their report, the MPs say current ‘opt-out’ filtering systems are not working and internet service providers (ISPs) should be compelled to introduce as standard an opt-in system that can only be unblocked by an adult to access pornographic content.
The report says that six in 10 children currently have unfiltered access to online porn at home and that exposure to online porn is having a serious and negative effect on children and young people’s attitudes to sex, relationships and body image. A 2008 YouGov poll found that 27 per cent of boys were accessing pornography online weekly, and five per cent were viewing it daily.
In other research cited in the report, a quarter of young people report receiving unsolicited pornographic junk mail, and almost one in eight say they have visited pornographic websites showing violent images.
The MPs say it is not enough for ISPs simply to offer customers filters that they can install on their home computers: parents don’t understand why they need to use the filters, or don’t know how to. Use of filters has dropped by 10 per cent in the last three years.
The MPS say more information and education should be provided to parents so they understand the need to take responsibility for monitoring their children’s internet safety, and how to do so. But they want the Government to encourage ISPs to introduce the opt-in system and, if ISPs fail to act, to enforce it by law.
‘Our inquiry found that many children are easily accessing internet pornography as well as other websites showing extreme violence or promoting self-harm and anorexia,’ said MP Claire Perry, who chaired the inquiry.
