A move to ensure the new school session in 2021 can be conducted safely, all schools in Malaysia are set to remain close for the rest of the year. The Ministry of Education decided the move after considering data analysis of COVID-19 cases involving students, teachers, and their close contacts. The new school year would begin on 20th January 2021. In addition, the Ministry has urged the school administrators to continue the home-based learning for teachers and students.
In conjunction with home-based learning, Kaspersky hosted an online forum to discuss ways keeping the kids safer online. Featuring industry experts; Ong Kian Yew, Chief Executive Officer at PIKOM (the National Tech Association of Malaysia), Datuk Dr Chiam Heng Keng, Founding President of The Early Childhood Care and Education Council Malaysia and Nazrudin Habibur Rahman, a TV Host, Actor, Entrepreneur and father of three, the conference was hosted by Deborah Priya Henry, TV host, model and co-founder of an NGO which focuses on children education.
Yeo Siang Tiong, General Manager for Southeast Asia at Kaspersky underlined that between March to May 2020, as many as 47%-51% of Malaysian kids spent most of their time online searching for learning materials related to their online classes.
“It is a good sign that kids in Malaysia are using technology in a productive way. Our Digital Comfort Zone Report quantified the increase of internet usage because of the pandemic at up to two more hours every day in Southeast Asia. 63% parents agreed that their children are using the internet more than they did on the same period as compared to last year. Our study also revealed that parents fear for their children’s online safety, but are not putting time to talk about them. Because of these, we are glad to initiate such conversations today,” says Yeo.
Nazrudin shares that, “For #teamnazrudin, we practice no smartphone during mealtimes and have conversations related to cyber safety, when they are in doubt. We are no experts in this area, but we will learn together,” he adds.
To ensure online safety, Kaspersky has some good tips for parents:
- Spend more time communicating with your children about online safety measures. Tell your children what must not, under any circumstances, be published on the Internet and why.
- Surf and learn together. See where they spend their time online and explore how to best keep them safe. Also spending time to play online games, so you can learn from each other.
- Explain that all the sensitive information can be shared only via messengers and only with people you know in real life.
- Kaspersky recommend parents to install cybersecurity software like Kaspersky Total Security to protect their kids against online threats. Kaspersky is offering a three-month free trial of Kaspersky Total Security, available through this link https://bit.ly/safekids011.
To get Kaspersky Safe Kids, please visit https://www.lazada.com.my/shop/kaspersky/ or https://shopee.com.my/kaspersky.os.
Together, let’s make online learning a safe haven for students.
