Our Kids, Their Screens, The Evidence
Watch our video and email your MP now to demand urgent action to protect our children.
Take ActionJOIN OUR CAMPAIGN TO DELAY SMARTPHONE USE AND KEEP KIDS SAFER ONLINE
We’re on a mission to make kids safer online. We aim to do this by:
Educating parents and carers about the harms children face online
Encouraging parents to delay devices for as long as possible
Making kids more digitally literate about scammers, predators and bullies
Teaching parents to set protective controls and time limits
Read the stats to see why we need to urgently rethink kids + tech
Even if you’ve set up controls or trust your child, they are at risk of being exposed to harmful content. Kids are often sent or shown damaging content, including extreme porn, by their peers or older children. Most don’t tell their parents, because of embarrassment, not wanting to make a fuss or not wanting to get themselves or another kid into trouble - and the blowback that this might produce socially or at school.
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Mental Health
Social media, in particular, is having a very negative effect on children’s mental health, and since lockdown and soaring screen time, this trend is getting worse.. Find out more about how smartphone use is contributing to this crisis.
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Grooming & Abuse
Children are very vulnerable to the manipulations of online predators, but also at risk of replicating the sexual abuse that is normalised online. Many are now even being investigated by police.- thousands of under 13s in the last few years alone.
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Addiction
Games and social media are highly addictive - and designed to be so. Imaging scans show that children’s brains are being affected - but we still don’t know the long-term effects. Read about why this is so important here.
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Online Bullying
Children are victims of the most extreme forms of online bullying - and as it’s on their phone and in their home, they can’t escape it as previous generations could. Too many children have been driven to self-harm and suicide..
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Porn & Relationships
The extreme content that many kids are seeing is horrifying. And the violent nature of many of these videos is having a major impact on how kids and young people behave.
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Online Scams
It’s far easier for scammers to target children, particularly as many have their payment methods stored on their phones. Find out more
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Algorithims & Fake News
Who’s choosing the next video your child watches? The tech companies. And they may be taking kids down a very dark path.
What can you do to protect children online?
SET UP CONTROLS: Protect your kids now by setting up basic controls and screen time restrictions. using our handy parental control guides.
SHARE THE RISKS: Please share with other parents so they realise how important it is to set up controls and educate their kids about online risks.
GET SUPPORT: If you have specific questions about dealing with this topic within your own family, visit our safer screen time facebook group.
SUPPORT US: Donate to our crowdfunder or on our website so we can launch paid social media campaigns to reach more parents and kids.
KEEP UPDATED: Our team are busy spotting the latest trends impacting children and we’ll be posting updates on our site and social media.
GET INVOLVED: Got something to add to the conversation or think you can help with our campaign? Please contact us on info@teched-off.com
How social media was designed to be extremely addictive
It is hard enough for adults to limit their social media use but children have much lower impulse control and are often very keen to get approval and fear missing out. They are therefore even more vulnerable to the addictive nature of social media and the dopamine hits it produces.