Strasbourg/Rio de Janeiro, 14.11.2007 – The Council of Europe today launches a game aimed at teaching children how to stay safe on the Internet.
The Wild Web Woods game has been developed to help children learn the rules of Internet safety in a fun format, using familiar fairy tales to guide children through a maze of potential danger to the fabulous “E-city”.
The game, mainly for children between 7 and 10, will be hosted on the Council of Europe Internet site, initially in English, and with 12 other European language versions to follow.
It has been developed in the spirit of the Council’s programme “Building a Europe for and with children”, set up to promote children’s rights and protect them from all forms of violence, including online danger. The game is also a fundamental step in the Council of Europe’s efforts to curb grooming of children by abusers through the internet, following the principles of the recently launched Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse.
With its launch at the UN Internet Governance Forum (12 to 15 November in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil), the Council of Europe also seeks to highlight the need for work both with children and adults to make the Internet safe for every age. The 47 nation organisation is in the vanguard of efforts to combat Internet crime, on the basis of key conventions on cybercrime, the prevention of terrorism, as well as the Convention on sexual abuse and exploitation.
The game can be found at http://www.coe.int
For more on the children’s programme: www.coe.int/children
Contacts:
Estelle Steiner, Press Officer, Mobile +33 (0)6 08 46 01 57, estelle.steiner@coe.int
Sophie Lobey, Communications Officer, Mobile +33 (0)6 64 09 93 40, sophie.lobey@coe.int
