Rakshit Tandon, a Cyber Security Expert from Delhi said false news is the biggest threat to India. He observed that the North Eastern region was very vulnerable to such attacks and said it only takes one second to send fake news about caste, creed or religion. The result is internet shutdown, he added.
Speaking during a one-day seminar on cyber safety at Baptist High (Auditorium), Mission Compound, Kohima for all heads of institutions under Nagaland Board of School Education (NBSE), he asked the teachers to be smart users, because, he added, fake news can cause huge damages and the resulting internet shutdown will handicap functionaries. Tandon advocated for educating the younger generations on such matters so that they may be aware of its threats.
The seminar covered cyber fraud such as fake profiles, cyber bullying, piracy, defamation, pornography, cyber stalking, hacking etc for the teaching staff and principals attending the event.
He asked the teachers if they were taught about cyber laws in the school. On receiving a negative response, he was emphatic in saying that imparting the knowledge of cyber laws was of paramount importance. To parents, Tandon said “Don’t give your phone to a kid as a toy but as technology”.
Speaking on Alexa, a virtual assistant developed by Amazon, he said some children do not talk to their parents but use Alexa to interpret their emotions. “This is the future generations of artificial intelligence” he said. He then spoke about teaching children the difference between fake and real.
Tandon also cautioned girls against sharing photos and information on social networking sites. “Smart phones have no privacy as everything is saved in the Google cloud or iCloud” he explained.
In his talk, Tandon also dwelt on fake profiles, misuse of public pages, and defamatory posts, as some of the major issues for teenagers. He demonstrated some preventive measures against some online systems of fraud.
A session was also conducted on the use of educational application software for enhancing learning in science and mathematics.