Online safety for children: why the line between “online” and “offline” has disappeared
By Sarah Loy, Safeguarding Lead at School-Home Support

As Safeguarding Lead at School-Home Support, my role is ultimately about helping to ensure that the children and families we work with are safe, and that our practitioners feel confident recognising concerns, responding appropriately and knowing when something needs to be escalated.

Online safety is now an integral part of safeguarding. For children, there isn’t really a clear divide between their online and offline worlds anymore. Their friendships, relationships, disagreements and vulnerabilities can move between the two very quickly.

At School-Home Support (SHS), we work with families who may already be experiencing significant challenges — poor school attendance, financial hardship, housing difficulties, family breakdown, mental health concerns or other vulnerabilities. Those pressures can sometimes increase a child’s vulnerability online.

Our role isn’t to frighten families about technology or tell them that children shouldn’t be online. Technology is an important and positive part of children’s lives. Instead, we want to help families understand the risks, have open conversations, and know where to go for help when something doesn’t feel right.

What we’re seeing in casework right now

The concerns we see are varied, and include cyberbullying, inappropriate or harmful content, contact with unknown adults, sexualised behaviour or imagery, and children becoming involved in online relationships that parents know very little about.

One of the challenges is the speed at which online spaces change. A parent may feel confident that they understand the risks associated with one platform, but their child may already have moved on to something completely different.

We also need to recognise that online vulnerability doesn’t exist in isolation. A young person who feels lonely, excluded from school, unhappy at home or desperate to belong somewhere may find that sense of connection online. Unfortunately, that need for friendship, attention, money, status or belonging can also be exploited by others.

Financial pressures create additional challenges too. Not every family has multiple devices, so children may share phones or accounts. Parents working long or irregular hours may find supervision difficult, and families living in temporary or overcrowded accommodation may have very little private or shared family space.

This is why, through our whole family support model, safeguarding needs to consider the whole picture rather than simply asking, “What has this child done online?” We need to understand what might be happening in a family’s wider life too.

Supporting parents who feel out of their depth

School-Home Support works with the whole family, not just the child, and many of the parents we work with feel overwhelmed or out of their depth with technology.

The first thing is not to make parents feel judged. Technology moves incredibly quickly, and it’s completely understandable that parents feel their children know far more about it than they do. We don’t want parents to think they need to become technology experts overnight.

Instead, we encourage curiosity and conversation: What does your child enjoy doing online? Who do they talk to? What games do they play? Who are their favourite creators? What would they do if somebody made them uncomfortable, and who would they tell? Those conversations are often more valuable than knowing every feature on every app.

It’s also important that children know they can tell an adult when something has gone wrong without immediately fearing that their phone will be confiscated or they’ll lose access to the internet. If their first thought is “Mum will take my phone away,” they may be less likely to disclose something serious. We want the message to be: “If something goes wrong online, you can tell me and we’ll deal with it together.”

Practical steps for families who don’t have time to master every app

I’d start with conversation rather than technology. You don’t have to understand every app your child uses, but you should have a general idea of what they’re doing online and who they’re communicating with.

A few simple things can make a real difference: talking regularly about what your child is doing online, not just when there’s a problem; agreeing family boundaries around devices, particularly overnight and at mealtimes; encouraging children not to share personal information such as their address, school, location or passwords; checking that privacy settings are appropriate and location sharing isn’t switched on unnecessarily; making sure children know how to block and report someone; encouraging them to tell a trusted adult if anyone asks them to keep an online conversation or relationship secret; and talking openly about the fact that people online aren’t always who they claim to be.

You don’t have to work everything out yourself. Schools and trusted online-safety organisations have excellent free resources that explain privacy settings, apps and emerging risks. Most importantly, try to make online safety part of everyday family conversation rather than one big, scary conversation.

Recognising the signs, and what to do next

There isn’t one definitive sign, and we need to be careful not to assume that every change in behaviour is linked to something happening online. However, some changes are worth being curious about — a child suddenly becoming secretive about their phone, appearing anxious when notifications arrive, withdrawing from friends or family, changes in mood or sleep, unexplained money or gifts, new language, or becoming very protective of a particular online relationship. Changes in school attendance, behaviour, friendships or engagement can also be important.

The key is to look at the child as a whole. If you’re worried, start with a calm conversation. Avoid beginning with accusations or demands to hand over a phone. Give the child an opportunity to explain what’s happening, and, importantly, listen. If a child tells you something concerning, don’t promise to keep it secret — reassure them that they have done the right thing by telling you, and explain that you may need to involve somebody who can help keep them safe.

For school staff, concerns should be shared promptly with the school’s Designated Safeguarding Lead and recorded in line with safeguarding procedures. Where there is concern that a child may be at immediate risk of harm, this needs an immediate safeguarding response.

How our practitioners work alongside schools to spot concerns early

One of the strengths of the SHS model is the relationship our practitioners build between the child, their family and their school. Our practitioners are embedded within school communities while also working directly with families, giving them a valuable understanding of what is happening both at school and at home.

Sometimes it is the accumulation of relatively small pieces of information that creates the safeguarding picture: a change in attendance, a comment from a child, something a parent mentions during a home visit, a change in friendship groups or behaviour noticed by school. Individually, those things may not appear significant. Together, they can tell us that something isn’t right.

Our practitioners work closely with school safeguarding teams and are expected to share concerns rather than investigate them themselves. Effective safeguarding depends on good professional curiosity, accurate recording and appropriate information sharing. Early intervention is particularly important for children who already have additional vulnerabilities — the earlier adults communicate and understand what is happening, the greater the opportunity to provide support before a situation escalates.

What worries me, and what gives me hope

What concerns me most is probably the pace of change. Children can access enormous online communities and increasingly sophisticated technology from a device in their pocket, and the adults responsible for safeguarding them are constantly trying to keep up. Artificial intelligence, deepfakes, increasingly realistic manipulated images and rapidly changing social platforms create challenges we are still learning how to navigate.

Misinformation and conspiracy theories are part of this picture too. We have recently been working with the Commission into Countering Online Conspiracies in Schools. The Commission recently found that the share of parents whose child has raised a conspiracy theory with them rose from around a quarter to over a third in a single year — a reminder that safeguarding conversations shouldn’t stop at bullying and harmful content alone.

I’m also concerned about the normalisation of harmful content — if children repeatedly see extreme, sexualised, misogynistic, violent or otherwise harmful material, there is a risk it begins to shape their understanding of what is normal or acceptable.

But there is also a lot that gives me hope. Children are often incredibly knowledgeable about the online world, and when adults genuinely listen to them rather than simply lecture them, they can teach us a great deal. We’re also seeing much greater awareness among parents, schools and safeguarding professionals that online safety isn’t an optional extra — it’s part of everyday safeguarding.

Ultimately, I don’t think the answer is trying to remove children from the online world. That isn’t realistic. Our job is to equip them to navigate it safely. If children know how to recognise when something isn’t right, feel confident setting boundaries and, most importantly, know there is a trusted adult they can turn to without fear of judgement, we’ve already put some very powerful protective factors around them. The most effective parental control will always be a child who feels able to talk to a trusted adult.

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