The dangers lurking online were emphasised by the Delhi High Court when it warned that minors should be educated about “virtual touch” so that they exercise caution and recognise predatory behaviour
By Dr Swati Jindal Garg
“There is only one remedy for ignorance and thoughtlessness, and that is literacy. Millions and millions of children would today stand in no need of sex education or consumer education or anti-racism education or any of those fake educations, if they had had in the first place ‘an’ education.”
—Richard Mitchell, US philosopher and scholar
Taking this adage a step ahead, the Delhi High Court, in a recent case involving a sexual crime said that besides educating minors about good and bad touch, schools, colleges and other stakeholders should also teach them about the dangers of “virtual touch”.
It is imperative in today’s world for minors to be conscious of the potential risks in cyberspace and the impact they can have on innocent lives. The Court said: “Apart from the concepts of ‘good touch’ and ‘bad touch’, minors must be taught the concept of ‘virtual touch’.” The statement was made by a single-judge bench of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma.
“Minors must be equipped with the knowledge and tools to navigate online interactions safely and recognise potential risks lurking in cyberspace. Educating minors about ‘Virtual Touch’ involves teaching them about appropriate online behaviour, recognising warning signs of predatory behaviour, and understanding the importance of privacy settings and online boundaries. Just as children are taught to exercise caution in the physical world, efforts must be made to teach them to develop critical thinking skills to assess the credibility of online contacts and safeguard their personal information,” the judge observed.
Justice Sharma emphasised that the need of the hour was to send a message through this Court’s order to all the concerned stakeholders like schools, colleges, Delhi State Legal Services Authority and Delhi Judicial Academy to hold programmes, workshops and conferences focusing not only on the traditional concepts of good and bad touch but on the emerging concept of virtual touch and its potential dangers so that the reach of the message is enlarged. “This court, therefore, emphasises that the concerned stakeholders should include in their curriculum apart from the education about good touch and bad touch the virtual touch and its repercussions and danger,” the High Court stressed.
These observations were made while refusing bail to a woman who was accused of helping the main accused, who was her son, commit sexual assault upon a 16-year-old girl in 2021. The woman was also accused of “forcing the victim for prostitution, as well as confining her to a room”.
Noting that the girl was allegedly kidnapped by a person who she met on a social media application and kept in a room and sexually assaulted for around 20-25 days, the High Court felt that it was high time that the concept of “virtual safety” was brought to light and more and more people talked about it.
The minor girl was subsequently coerced into marriage with a 45-year-old man against her will in exchange for a sum of money. Taking due note of the agony experienced by the victim, the Court observed that in today’s fast paced virtual modern world, the virtual space has also become a breeding ground of alleged virtual affections between teenagers. Even though technology was developing fast, teenagers were not equipped to deal with the “potential dangers of human trafficking for prostitution” and other crimes which possibly exist therein.
The virtual world can be especially dangerous for children and teens who are the most vulnerable. From cyber predators to social media posts that can come back to haunt them later in life, online hazards can have severe, costly, even tragic consequences. Children may unwittingly expose their families to internet threats by accidentally downloading malware that could give cyber criminals access to their parents’ bank account or other sensitive information. Protecting children on the internet is a matter of awareness—knowing what dangers lurk there and how to safeguard against them. Although cyber security software can help protect against some threats, the most important safety measure is open communication with children. Threats from the online world may be broadly classified into: Cyber bullying, cyber predators, posting private information, phishing, falling for scams, accidently downloading malware, and posts that come back to haunt a child later in life.
A 2018 survey of children’s online behaviour revealed that approximately 60% of those who use social media have witnessed some form of bullying. According to enough.org, as of February 2018, nearly half (47%) of all young people had been victims of cyber bullying. As if this statistics is not enough, the online world has also become the stalking ground for sexual and predatory behaviour. Children and teens due to their innocence, lack of adult supervision and trusting nature are often the targets. The pitfalls are many, including children being lured into dangerous encounters like the case before the Delhi High Court.
Another issue arises due to children not being able to identify personal and social boundaries. Due to this lack of clarity, they may post certain personally identifiable information online that should not be out in public, eg., images of awkward personal moments, their home addresses, family vacation plans, etc.
What still needs discussion is the “Problem of Permanence” which arises from the fact that the internet does not have a “delete” key. Things that happen online, stay online forever. Anything that a child puts online is nearly impossible to remove later. The dangers of social media are especially daunting and it is hard for teenagers to consider how a party picture or Snapchat message could cause problems ten years down the road. Problems could arise when they go for an interview for a new job, or a prospective partner responds negatively to personal content they may have posted or they could get blackmailed by a morphed photo or video that has been deep-faked. Parents and guardians need to be doubly vigilant of their child’s online safety.
Benjamin Spock, the famous American pediatrician, rightly said: “Does sex education encourage sex? Many parents are afraid that talking about sex with their teenagers will be taken as permission for the teen to have sex. Nothing could be further from the truth. If anything, the more children learn about sexuality from talking with their parents and teachers and reading accurate books, the less they feel compelled to find out for themselves.”
Knowledge, they say, is power.
—The writer is an Advocate-on-Record practicing in the Supreme Court, Delhi High Court and all district courts and tribunals in Delhi