“British children are spending more than 20 hours a week online, most of it at social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Bebo, and are in effect being “raised online,” according to research from the Institute for Public Policy Research.
The research reinforces the belief of big online brands that social networking sites are the way to get advertisers in front of the lucrative youth market. This month AOL snapped up the world’s third largest networking site, Bebo, for $850m (£417m) while Facebook gained a $15 billion valuation last year when Microsoft spent $240 million on a small stake in the company.
But the IPPR research, to be published next month, raises concerns about the content that young people can access and the lack of awareness among parents about what their children are doing on the Internet.
“’My mum will ask sometimes “Is it safe?” but she doesn’t really know,’” a 16-year-old girl told the IPPR. A 14-year-old boy added that even the sort of child-locks that are put on Internet access at school can be circumvented by youngsters, who often know more about IT systems than their teachers. ‘We have restrictions at school but we can just get an administrator’s account and take them off.’
“Children are also aware of the restrictions that the sites implement, with one 15-year-old girl telling researchers: ‘Everyone lies about their age ‘cos I think it’s like if you’re under 18, your profile gets set to private.’
“The report shows that teenagers are digitally promiscuous, switching allegiance from sites as fashions change. One 16-year-old girl told the IPPR: ‘First it was like everyone was on MSN, then everyone sort of has Bebo, now everyone who had MSN moved on to Facebook, so it’s just what everyone’s doing at that time.’”
