In this final thrilling episode before your kids earn their PhoneSmart Licence, the bonds of friendship are tested to the limit by a deep fake story that has the whole town in a frenzy. A gripping tale to help teach your kids to understand what fake news is and its potential risks. Also give them the skills to use search engines and social media to verify information.
Give your kids the skills
- To understand how online advertising works.
- To use the social networks properly as an information source.
- To be able to spot fake news and sponsored content.
- Understand the dangers of deepfake technology.
- To use online tools to verify information.
The wonderful and the worrisome
1 in 3
children believe that social media stories are truthful.
Source: National Literacy Trust and APPG, ‘Fake News and Critical Literacy’, 2017
34%
of parents said they were concerned fake news and
misinformation would make their children worried or
anxious.
Source: Internet Matters and Opinium, ‘Impact
Tracking’, October 2020
Two thirds
of identity theft committed against young people
by 2030 will be caused by information shared by
parents.
Source: BBC News & Barclays, ‘'Sharenting' puts
young at risk of online fraud’, May 2018
Simple ways to support your child
The best way to prevent your child being affected by fake news is to develop their critical digital skills. To help your child spot fake news, you can tell them to:
- read the whole article as headlines can be deliberately misleading
- use fact checking sites such as fullfact.org and snopes.com
- look for spelling mistakes and other errors in the content and see what other sites it links to
- wait for a couple of days to see what others think if they’re not sure whether something is real or fake
If your child has been affected by fake news or you need more help and information then, please visit.