Under the auspices of the European Commission, Better Internet for Kids (BIK) core service platform works to share resources, services and practices between national providers of the services – the European Safer Internet Centres (SICs) – and to provide services to their users, including industry.
Under the auspices of the European Commission, Better Internet for Kids (BIK) core service platform works to share resources, services and practices between national providers of the services – the European Safer Internet Centres (SICs) – and to provide services to their users, including industry.
In line with the European Commission’s Better Internet for Kids strategy, the key vision behind the BIK core service platform is to create a better internet for children and young people. In more practical terms, it is our mission is to foster – through the BIK core service platform – the exchange of knowledge, expertise, resources and best practices between key online safety stakeholders, including industry, in order to increase access to high-quality content for children and young people, step up awareness and empowerment, create a safe environment for children online, and fight against child sexual abuse and child sexual exploitation.
More specifically, the BIK core service platform environment contains the following key components:
- BIK Portal: This public-facing web platform provides a central point of access for the wider stakeholders and the general public for information, guidance and resources on better internet issues, acting as a signposting service to SICs, and other stakeholder content and services where appropriate. Specific content and services are also provided and delivered through the site such as the BIK Bulletin (an electronic quarterly bulletin, disseminated via email but archived on the site), a Guide to online services, a repository of eSafety resources, and so on.
- BIK Community: This private community for Insafe-INHOPE Safer Internet Centres – available upon registration and sign-in only – includes a range of collaborative capacity-building tools which facilitate the exchange of knowledge, ideas, expertise and best practices. The results of ongoing work on this internal community are rolled out both through various targeted channels on the public-facing portal and via other communication channels.
- BIK Youth area: The BIK Youth area provides a secure, moderated, collaborative space for youth participation interactions at national, European and international level, where youth have access to their own capacity-building tools, and can meet with youth coordinators from their national Safer Internet Centre to discuss, debate and share ideas, resources, and so forth.
- SID mini-site: The SID portal, available at www.saferinternetday.org, is integrated as a mini-site into the BIK core service platform infrastructure, and it provides a global platform where SICs, global SID Committees and supporters, and international organisations (i.e. SID stakeholders) can showcase events and actions conducted locally, nationally and internationally for Safer Internet Day.
Furthermore, the platform creators closely collaborate with the International Association of Internet Hotlines (INHOPE) in order to coordinate and animate the European network of Safer Internet Centres, each focusing on their respective strands of work (i.e. awareness, youth participation and helpline versus hotline), as well as to externally represent the Better Internet for Kids agenda and European Safer Internet Centres, reaching out to policy makers, industry, teachers, parents, young people and children both through the BIK core service platform and through the participation in and organisation of meetings, campaigns and events.
For further information on the BIK project generally, contact the BIK Coordination Team.
