Keep Kids' Tech Grinch-Free This Christmas

Act for Kids is urging parents and carers to secure electronic devices and boost parental controls before kids receive these gifts this Christmas Day.

The national child protection organisation is encouraging parents to have a frank conversation with their children about online harms before they unwrap laptops, iPads, smart phones, gaming consoles and smart TVs.

The warning comes amid a rise in the number of children, some even as young as infants, accessing the internet from devices.

This has correlated with an upwards trend in cases of online child exploitation, including grooming and image-based abuse, according to the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation (ACCCE).

Act for Kids own research revealed that three quarters (78%) of Australians blamed inappropriate sexual behaviours on access to online content.

But worryingly, parents are not taking the necessary precautions to protect their children online, as research also found that two-thirds (63%) of parents failed to secure devices with passwords and one in two (55%) allowed their children unsupervised access online.

And according to eSafety research, more than half (57%) of Australian young people aged 12 to 17 had seen online content featuring real violence.

Act for Kids is encouraging everyone to keep devices out of the bedroom to ensure there is some oversight over what children are accessing and to help create safer online experience.

"Another simple way parents and carers can protect kids online is by setting up parental controls on all devices, which is essentially software that allows you to monitor and set limits on their online activity," Act for Kids Acting CEO Tom McIntyre said.

"It's not just devices parents need to be wary of - we're also extremely concerned about popular gaming platforms like Roblox which has a chatroom function that allows strangers to contact children using the platform unless it is manually turned off in the settings.

"If children are receiving gaming gift cards this Christmas, check to see you can turn off chat functions on these platforms beforehand."

Here are some simple steps to keep kids safe this Christmas:

• Secure household devices by setting parental controls on all devices.
• Supervise children online and monitor the material they are accessing.
• Turn off chatroom functions on gaming platforms.
• Keep devices in a shared family area, this will assist to regularly check their privacy settings and internet search limitations as well as yours.