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Ghana to criminalise inappropriate internet content

By
Gifty Amofa, GNA

Accra, Oct. 22, GNA
– Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, the Minister of Communications, has announced that
Ghana would soon criminalise the sharing of inappropriate social media content.

She said the law
would soon be enshrined with strict penalties so that sending, retaining, and
sharing of such contents would be punishable by law.

The Communication
Minister cited sexual images as an example of inappropriate content, adding
that all should comply with the domestic laws, when passed, to avoid being
penalized.

Mrs Owusu-Ekuful was
addressing stakeholders on the second day of the National week celebration of
the Cyber Security Awareness Month 2019, being held at the Kofi Annan
International Peacekeeping Training Centre (KAIPTC), Teshie, Accra.

Dubbed:
“Demonstrating Ghana’s Cyber Security Readiness,” the programme brought
together security agencies, heads of departments, school children and others to
discuss Child Online Protection (COP) and develop a framework to curb the risk
posed to young people for using the internet.

The Minister said
there would be sufficient provision in the law to protect children/adolescents
from online abuse.

She, therefore,
called on the public to be wary of such messages, delete as soon as they
received them, and avoid passing them on. 

The Ministry is
working with the Attorney General, and Ministry of Gender, Children and Social
Protection, among others to come-up with the framework on child online
development and welfare within the shortest possible time.

Mrs Owusu-Ekuful
said most children had become active users of the internet for learning but
were unfortunately faced with a lot of challenges, which affected their human
rights and, therefore, the need to protect them.

She said most of the
laws of Ghana were enacted before child online protection came up, as a result,
sufficient laws should be put in place to protect children being abused on the
internet.

Government, she
said, had increased awareness among children across all the regions and by the
end of October, 40 schools would have been reached.

She said cyber
security policy would be reviewed to meet international standards and called on
corporate bodies to support government since it was their collective interest
to protect the children.

Hajia Samira
Bawumia, the Wife of the Vice President, said a collaborative effort was
essential to protect children from online predators.

Quoting UNICEF’s
research done in 2016, she said four out of 10 children had seen sexual images
and half of the 2000 children used in the survey expressed online abuse by
adults.

She, therefore,
called on government, educators, civil society organisations, international
development partners to come up with policies and legislations to protect young
internet users.

Hajia Samira
commended the Ministry of Communications for initiating channels whereby
victims who feared reporting to the police could report to seek redress.

“Parents have to be
abreast of the use of the internet in order to guide their children on its
usage as their children mostly knew more than them,” she advised.

Madam Anne-Clare
Dufay, UNICEF-Ghana Representative, called on industry players to make their
products child-friendly to prevent them from being taken advantage of.

Dr Albert
Antwi-Boasiako, the National Cyber Security Advisor, said child protection
issues needed a multi-sectorial approach where children themselves should not
be left out of the solution.

Madam Afisah
Zakaria, the Chief Director of Ministry of Gender, Children and Social
Protection, called for the monitoring of service providers of sex sites to
protect children from accessing those sites.

GNA

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