The Director-General, National Information Technology Development Agency, (NITDA), Mallam Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, has admonished secondary school students to always display high levels of responsibility whenever they are online in order to be protected from cyber risks.
Represented by NITDA’s Head, Digital Technology, Adoption, Digital Literacy and Skill Unit, Dr Ayodele Bakare, Abdullahi gave this advice in Abuja at this year’s inter-school debate organised by the Junior Chamber International, (JCI), and supported by the Agency.
The topic for the debate was ‘Should Social Media Be Encouraged Among Secondary School Students?’
Mallam Abdullahi stated that, as secondary school students, using the internet facilities, it is expected of them to behave responsibly in order to be protected from psychological and physical risks that are common online.
According to the DG, some of the psychological risks the children could suffer from if they are irresponsible online are; fear, low self-esteem, promiscuousness, violence, poor academic performance, among others.
He added that “among the physical risks you can experience online could be illness, injury, death, vandalization, and loss of finance.”
He stated further that, “your responsibilities online include non-disclosure of personal information to strangers, avoidance of people or strangers that demand for too much information, turn down offers to meet online strangers, not the opening of emails or files from unknown sources, and always inform parents or teachers whenever you feel concerned about strangers online.”
The DG advised children to limit the time they spend online to not affect other spheres of their lives, particularly their academic performance.
Mallam Abdullahi maintained that child online safety has become imperative in order to protect them from threats and risks because, children are easily influenced by online contents, assuring that as a government agency, NITDA will keep on with advocacy and capacity building on online safety for minors.
“Another way government is trying to protect children online is in the area of policy formulation, regulations and guideline on child online safety,” he said.
The President of JCI, Ajalat Aminat Aweke, said the aim of the debate is to discover another set of young lads among students in the Federal Capital Territory, adding that the topic for the debate captures the rave of the moment on the usage of social media among secondary students.
“The debate will form a robust discussion and form a framework for censorship,” she said.
About 10 Secondary Schools participated in this year’s debate where Government Secondary School Gwagwalada emerged first and was awarded three laptops and a N100,000 cash award.
Government Secondary School, Mabushi, emerged second and went away with N75,000, while Government Girls Secondary School, Dutsen Alhaji, became the third winner and received N50,000 award.
In the same vein, the Coordinator, National Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotic, (NCAIR), Mr. Ya’u Garba Isah, stated that robotics would help avoid the obstacle in computing programming.
He expressed this view during the second day of the JCI programme supported by NITDA.
He said, mentoring the students on technological innovation would promote the motive of JCI which is in line with the mandate of the centre.
The selected trainees hosted at the centre were the students that excelled at the inter-school debate that JCI organised.
