Paedophilia in the internet age: The role of parents in child protection | EduCeleb
EduCeleb
20th June 2021
By Rotimi Onadipe
In today’s internet age, the introduction of social media websites, smartphone, iPad and other digital devices has a lot of positive impacts in the social, academic, financial and spiritual life of the users. Social media is a powerful medium for communication and the introduction of the internet is a great comfort to many lives.
Despite the great benefits of the introduction of the internet, we must be informed about the danger of abnormal usage of the internet and the threat it poses to the society, particularly the young children. One of the dangerous effects of abnormal usage of the internet in today’s technology age is the prevalence of paedophilia.
Paedophilia is the condition in which an adult is being sexually attracted to young children.
A paedophile is someone who is sexually interested in children.
Paedophiles have done incalculable damage to the lives of many innocent children around the world. Many children have been killed by the perpetrators while others are now living with the trauma. It is very unfortunate that most parents don’t take the menace of paedophilia seriously until their children have become victims.
Paedophilia is becoming more prevalent and the perpetrators are getting smarter, particularly with the use of technology to get their victims. According to a report by the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC), more than 10,000 offences of online child sex abuse were recorded between April 2019 and March 2020, a 16% increase on the previous year.
In order to protect the children from this prevailing evil, parents must educate themselves and their children about how to spot a paedophile and prevent him from carrying out his evil mission.
Rotimi Onadipe is of Ona Tech Consult