11 April 2013 Fiona Murphy - Cyber Crime and staying safe on line.

Last Thursday's meeting at the Westlands Hotel heard of some of the issues around the use of the internet and social media and the growing availability and demand for smart phones and other mobile devices, particularly with the younger age groups.

Fiona Murphy spoke of her experience as Schools Liason Officer, working for Central Esafety Partnership whose role is to engage with communities to deliver practical advice and information on safe use of the internet and digital technology.

Fiona outlined the scale of the use of social media by noting there were 700,000 updates on Facebook every second. She spoke of the risks associated with the growing popularity of online activities - gambling, shopping and gaming addiction were just a few examples. Also grooming of vulnerable people was a major problem and there was no such thing as a 'typical' offender in this category.

She outlined measures that the Esafety Partnership recommend to the various groups they work with, including controls on access to websites, restrictions on content of games and monitoring of social network sites, for example. Other online risks were illustrated including being caught out by plausible looking emails which turned out to be fraudsters trying to gain access to your computer or elict bank information.

Fiona recommended a number of helpful websites, including www.actionfraud.police.uk where you can find out about the latest scams and also report fraud to the police.

After fielding a series of questions from members, Fiona was thanked for a very interesting and thought provoking presentation by Graham Russell.