Cybersecurity Kids - Crossing the street online: An evaluation of learnability of age-appropriate educational content on cybersecurity & -safety

Abstract

The Internet is full of false claims about supposedly effective preventive- and countermeasures to cybersafety and cybersecurity risks, and the majority of computer users are not well-informed on this topic. The average user utilizes the Internet to educate themselves and, among other things, to answer questions that their children ask. But when it comes to cybersecurity threats, there are plenty of risk measure recommendations on the Internet, which can be confusing. Of the few sites that provide practical measures, there are only a few that comply with current German standards. So, how are German adults (parents and teachers) supposed to qualitatively educate themselves, apply this knowledge and also pass it on to their children? Additionally, how are children, who may be just learning to research, supposed to get reliable cybersafety and cybersecurity knowledge?

This work creates a unified platform in which online risks and coherent recommendations on measures are presented in an age-appropriate manner. In doing so, the abilities of the children’s respective development level must be taken into account in order to create content that can be understood by all user groups (children, guardians, and teachers).

To this end, the informational and educational content will be embedded in a developed website, where the content will be communicated audiovisually to children and to adults in textual form. Practical examples, in the form of pictures, in order to facilitate constructivist learning, are given. Finally, the extent to which the content was able to influence the knowledge of adults and children in the field of cybersecurity risks is measured, by conducting a within-groups study consisting of two online surveys.

This study expands upon the work done by Renaud and Prior and uses the results obtained on risks and their age relevancies for children. Recommendations from numerous German ministries and government agencies were consulted to verify the accuracy and relevance of the proposed measures from the researched websites.