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Communicating on child protection

Telefónica O2 UK communicates extensively with employees to ensure they are equipped to inform customers about the responsible use of mobiles.

Starting in 2006 we have worked in partnership with children’s internet charity Childnet International to raise awareness of online child protection issues. Our network of around 100 Child Protection Champions - all of them working in customer-facing roles – have continued to receive special training so that they can provide real, useful, honest, practical advice to parents on how best to protect their children. We have and collaborated with CEOP on plans to train some of our child protection champions to deliver Think U Know, their education and awareness programme, to children: thinkuknow.co.uk
 
Working with Childnet we produced a short film about child protection which has been distributed through the intranet to all employees. Aimed at O2 staff, the film aims to increase their understanding of online child protection risks and the steps O2 is taking to address these.

In 2007 we produced a new advice leaflet called O2's mobile phone guide for parents. This leaflet updates and consolidates our advice for parents on all child protection matters, including such issues as what your child’s mobile can do, handset theft, bullying on mobile phones, the safe use of camera phones, nuisance calls and safety in chat rooms. We regularly check to make sure the leaflet is available in our retail stores.

Our dedicated website includes a checklist of important questions for parents to ask a mobile operator when purchasing a phone. It includes practical advice on all aspects of child protection, from text bullying to harmful web content: protectourchildren.o2.co.uk

The ‘Protect Our Children’ website supplies phone number services to help parents to: control web access, block 18+ content; enable security settings and privacy; report Spam; stop unwanted text.
It also gives information that helps children deal with cyber bullying, use camera phones responsibly, protect themselves from phone crime and use chatrooms safely.

We work closely with other parts of Telefónica to share knowledge and best practice and support the development and implementation of content standards and online child protection capabilities.

In February 2007, on European Safer Internet Day, Telefónica signed up to the new European Framework for Safer Mobile Use by Younger Teenagers and Children.