Scene at the signing of a cooperation deal on child protection in cyberspace among Microsoft Vietnam, the Department of Child Affairs under the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, and the ChildFund Vietnam(Photo: VNA)
Microsoft Vietnam will sponsor 5.4 billion VND (233,676 USD) to aid Vietnam’s efforts in protecting children online as part of a freshly signed agreement.
The cooperation deal on child protection in cyberspace was signed in Hanoi on July 12 by Microsoft Vietnam, the Department of Child Affairs under the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, and the ChildFund Vietnam.
The pact stipulates that Microsoft Vietnam’s financial and technical assistance will be offered to the other two parties over the next 25 months.
The project aims to help boost communication campaigns that raise public awareness about the cyber-safety of children, in particular some relevant protection skills.
It will also build web-based data that enable users to report child abuse cases, and an application that provides technical solutions for child safety in cyberspace. The two programmes, operating on both web and mobile platforms, will first be carried out within the frameworks of two child protection projects run by the ChildFund in Hoa Binh, Cao Bang, and Bac Kan provinces.
The signing ceremony took place at a conference on building a protection network for children online, during which representatives from the Department of Child Affairs, the Department of Information Security under the Ministry of Information and Communications, the ChildFund Vietnam, Microsoft Vietnam, the SecDev Foundation, and UNICEF, among others, shared their experiences and voiced commitments to the programme.
Michael Gray, Vietnam Program Director at the Canadian-based SecDev Foundation, said the building of the protection network is a practical activity for the Government, social organisations, and businesses in Vietnam.
Dang Hoa Nam, Director of the Department of Child Affairs, said the Government and various public agencies have always paid heed to child protection work, particularly in cyberspace.
The responsibility requires the concerted efforts of the Government, social organisations, businesses, the media, and individuals so that children can enjoy their right to access information and grow comprehensively in the digital age, he stressed.
Vietnam, which joined the World Wide Web in 1997, calculated 64 million locals, or 67 percent of the population, using the internet as of June 2017.
VNA
