1. “Safe Surfing in Libraries: Filtering, Acceptable Uses and Practice” October 2002 Nick Morgan

2. Safe for Who? Children and Young People Adults Staff Local authorities

3. Safe from What? Content - harmful and illegal material, viruses, etc Communication - personal approaches, harassment, libel, copyright Commerce - advertising, junk email, fraud, etc

4. Safer than Where? Why surf at a Library? - available and free - faster - fewer restrictions - less supervision - quality of staff support

5. Context Internet: rapidly changing, new uses, new technologies Access: improving in homes, schools, libraries and community venues Users: many novices / infrequent users, with low levels of skills and awareness

6. Underlying premise We want Library users to have beneficial experiences online, but new opportunities also mean new risks. Chat is the most high-profile example; here’s another..

7. Approach to Internet Safety Prevention is best Minimise and manage the Risks Encourage appropriate Behaviour Record, report and review any problems and solutions. Change policies and practice

8. Technical measures Hardware and Software set up to restrict access and reduce risks –filtering and blocking –controlled PC desktop and limitations on functionality –anti-virus protection –monitoring

9. Technical measures - 2 Limitations on applications and software - no newsgroups, chat, IRC, File Transfer, new installations Layout and arrangement of PCs

10. Human measures Policies and procedures Restrictions on uses (e.g. no games or business activity) Supervision and compliance-checks Staff training and updating

11. Human measures - 2 Advice to users, in print or online Recommend controlled services (e.g. Yahooligans and GridClub) Educating users Staff communication and review: talk about problems, situations, policies

12. Filtering and blocking Ethical objections to its use for adults, but widely accepted for children Practical problems to its use - over-blocking, under-blocking, and time spent on its administration Not just Porn!

13. Filtering and blocking - 2 Monitoring for compliance and breaches Rights of individuals - freedom of information, confidentiality Rights of the Police Influence of community groups and individuals

14. Acceptable Use Policies Why have them? Who do they apply to? How do you present them? One-off signature or online and each time Linked to booking systems? Sanctions?

15. AUPs - coverage Retrieval Email: Rules, Filtering (incoming and outgoing), Disclaimers Storage space Publishing many other activities

16. Current UK initiatives Government advice to local authorities, schools, etc - “Superhighway Safety” and “Clickthinking” Peoples Network advice and exemplars “Be Safe Online” website

18. Conclusions: Combine technical and human measures, supervision and education A continuing need to review practice, update advice, repeat training, etc Safety is a shared responsibility, for users, library staff and authorities - Tell me your problems!

19. Thank You Nick Morgan Learning and Teaching Scotland Victoria Crescent Road Glasgow G12 9JN n.morgan@ltscotland.com