Ensure pupils don’t have a digital target on their back

It’s important to introduce children to the dark side of their digital footprint, writes Tes’ ed-tech expert
2nd June 2017, 12:00am
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Ensure pupils don’t have a digital target on their back

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archived/ensure-pupils-dont-have-digital-target-their-back

Unless you’ve been temporarily residing on another planet, you’ll be aware that we are now in the throes of general election fever. What you might not know is that our interactions on social media and beyond can be used by political parties to target us with campaigns that will appeal to us.

Think about it: information about our interests, and what charities and causes we support could help a political party pick and choose what parts of their campaign they present to us.

Most of us aren’t blind to the fact that information is being collected about us with every keystroke, but are we aware to what extent it could be used to manipulate us and go far beyond what Amazon recommends we buy next?

And if, in fact, we could be targeted in the context of an event such as a general election, because this side of campaigning is relatively unregulated, then maybe we need to take what we teach pupils about their digital footprints to the next level?

In my primary school, we introduce children to the idea that they have a digital footprint, get them to think about what theirs looks like in a typical week and teach them about tools such as the history function in internet browsers. Digital citizenship curricula clearly need to take this further for older students.

Who’s watching us?

Just recently a group of digital campaign experts launched a free piece of software called Who Targets Me?, which enables voters to keep track of how the main political parties are manipulating their personal Facebook feeds based on their public personal data. The Who Targets Me? website (whotargets.me ) spells it out: “For the good of our democracy, it’s time to throw some light on dark ads.” It may be worth installing the free Chrome add-on and showing students what you found out about how your data has been used.

Another website that’s useful for taking the topic of digital footprints to the next level is Trackography (trackography.org), which aims to show us who is tracking us when we browse the internet. It allows users to generate a map, which shows the companies that track us through media websites we might use, the countries that host the servers of the websites we access and the countries that host the servers of the tracking companies. The way the links grow across the map is quite striking.

Teaching students about digital footprints in this detail isn’t about scaremongering, or even changing how they use social media, but rather about providing awareness so that, at the very least, the question “am I being targeted here?” is in the back of their minds, as it should be with all of us.


Claire Lotriet is an assistant headteacher at Henwick Primary School in London. She tweets @OhLottie and blogs at clairelotriet.com

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