Scots parents have been given a stark warning about the dangers of failing to understand the threats posed by the online world in which today’s young people live.
More than 50,000 paedophiles each one “a potential abuser” are feared to be active within the UK, scouring the internet for targets.
And bullying has “migrated online”, with youngsters increasingly trading terrifying insults and abuse on social networking sites.
Speaking to The Courier in Perth, the director of Scotland’s anti-bullying service said many parents remained oblivious to the dangers and frightened of the technology.
Brian Donnelly, who heads respectme, said the nation needs to take a new look at online safety and at educating children and adults.
He visited the city for talks with The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre’s Jim Gamble and representatives from Perth and Kinross Council and police.
The Perth meeting took place as Minister for Learning Alasdair Allan announced the nation’s first research into young people’s experiences of online bullying.
It will be led by respectme and aims to identify how bullying and online bullying overlap, how youngsters use the internet and social networking and where they visit.
The results will be used to help shape services and, importantly, better educate parents, carers and professionals who work with children and young people.
Mr Donnelly said: “We need to bridge the gap between what parents understand and the reality of what their kids do and where they go online.
“Bullying has always happened but what we are seeing is that it is migrating to the online spaces that young people are using all the time.
“A great deal of social media is very intuitive and very easy for teens and young people to use but that does not mean that they are mature enough to use it safely or wisely.
“Many children simply do not understand the permanence of the impact of online bullying and that what they say online does not simply disappear into the ether.
“There is a lot that we need to learn and hopefully this new research will help us talk about the reality of bullying today.”
Bullying remains a serious issue, but the internet can also be a hunting ground for dangerous predators who use it to “sexually abuse” vulnerable and isolated young people without ever meeting them.
That insidious threat was highlighted this week as a Kinross man, who groomed a 14-year-old girl and persuaded her to send him indecent photographs by posing as a modelling scout, was jailed for 10 months.
Mr Gamble said more needed to be done to protect, support and advise young people who find that they are being bullied, abused or exploited.
“The people who prey upon young people in this fashion scour the online environment, identifying potential targets.
“The key to stop this is providing an active deterrent and that means predators standing in the dock and it is no good if only one or two do so.
“There are 50-60,000 people across the UK downloading indecent images and every one of them is a potential abuser.”
The new bullying research project was announced as Dr Allan met pupils and staff at Preston Street Primary School in Edinburgh to talk about tackling online abuse.