Survey reveals Filipino parents confident in engaging children in online safety

MANILA, Philippines — This generation of kids is lucky. They have the internet to turn to for research work. They do not need to spend hours in the library pouring over volumes of books, which have to be located by going through index cards on the subject.

With the convenience of accessing information, however, comes the ever-present danger of children being exposed to inappropriate content and internet fraud. They need to be made aware of the danger lurking on the web so they do not fall prey to any of them. It is best to keep them safe by blocking off those sites.

The good news is that, according to Google’s latest Online Safety Survey, the majority of parents in the Philippines (87.4%) are confident in engaging their child on the topic of online safety.

However, parents are finding it increasingly challenging to keep up, with 53.2% of Filipino parents having difficulty finding the right time to talk about online safety with their children. This is an increase from just 40% recorded in 2022.

At the same time, digital ground rules are changing as their child grows up: 71.1% of parents in the Philippines expect to change their rules for their child's internet use as their child gets older.                                                                              

As part of its commitment and mission to make the internet safer for people all over, Google has a variety of useful features to improve the online experiences of children and parents alike.

This year’s survey showed that the most common online safety issue for children is seeing inappropriate content online, happening at least once to 61% of children (compared to 54% last year). This is followed by seeing misinformation, deceptive ads or spam, and violent content.

The good news is parents can turn to the easy-to-use solutions by Google with “Family Link.” They can also use another useful feature in “SafeSearch,” which is on by default for signed-in users under 18 and helps filter inappropriate, explicit and mature content. Its new blurring setting, which is now available to everyone, automatically blurs explicit imagery — such as adult or graphic violent content — by default when it appears in