such as a smartphone, laptop, tablet, etc. We live in a digital world where internet use is widespread.

Nowadays, a growing number of children have access to the internet via portable electronic devices

such as tablets, laptops, and gaming consoles. Online social networks (OSN) have become

increasingly popular and are now widely used along with the rise of the internet. A large percentage of

children worldwide have profiles on at least one online social networking site. Children register on

these platforms so they can communicate with their peers, make new friends, share their interests and

hobbies in the hopes of meeting someone who has similar ones, play games, and more. But in addition

to the benefits and enjoyment that kids derive from social networks, there are also risks and dangers

that specifically target children on OSN platforms. Online harassment, online predators, sexual

solicitation, cyberbullying, and cyber grooming are all threats that target children on OSNs. This

Received: June 3, 2022. Revised: December 19, 2022. Accepted: January 22, 2023. Published: February 22, 2023.

1 Introduction

The development of the internet and its widespread

use provides a wide range of possibilities for

communication, interaction, entertainment,

education, information gathering, and many other

activities, thus becoming a necessary component in

today's modern and digital era. Today's youth

spends a significant amount of time online, whether

for learning, communicating with peers through

interfering with their ability to focus, hindering

them from sleeping, and making them subject to

bullying, rumours, online harassment, and

various threats and risks that are present in OSNs

that target children, Section 5 gives guidelines on

how to better protect children and teenagers on

OSNs and Section 6 concludes the paper and

proposes future work.

2 Related Work

Fire, Goldschmidt, and Elovici [3] presented a

taxonomy of numerous security threats that put the

solutions that have been implemented to improve

OSN user privacy, security, and protection.

The author [4] discusses the dangers and effects of

social media on children, focusing on preteens and

young teenagers while also including information

from older teenagers, particularly in Canada and the

US. He discusses the dangers that the youths face as

a result of the inappropriate and harmful content that

is available on social media, as well as the

consequences that lack of online privacy and

awareness approaches. As a result, they included a

list of risks for children, a list of commonly used

a list of the factors the researchers took into account

while analyzing cybersecurity awareness strategies

and solutions.

In the study [2] the risks and threats that children

who use the internet and online social networks are

exposed to are identified through a review of the

literature on internet use by minors and the

the Prevention of Cruelty to Children), police in

England and Wales recorded 1,944 instances of

sexual communication with minors in the six

months leading up to September 2018 [16]. Of the

1,317 incidents where a method was recorded, 32%

of them involved Instagram, 23% Facebook, and

14% Snapchat. While Snapchat called grooming

acquired by the NSPCC, almost 5,000 internet

grooming offences were reported by police in the 18

months that followed [16].

with harassment that arise from many types of

unwanted internet contact. According to research,

the two most prevalent types of online harassment

are cyberbullying and cyberstalking [5].

user interaction, which is partly the result of kids

and teenagers not properly protecting their internet

privacy [4]. Due to the nature of the internet,

cyberbullying can occur at any time and can spread

simply and fast to a large online audience [4]. It can

victim does not know them in roughly one-third of

cases [4]. Cyberbullying differs from traditional

bullying in that the offender can remain anonymous

by using a fake account, making it practically

impossible for the victim to track them down or

sexual extortion that ended tragically is the case of

Amanda Todd [17]. Amanda was a 15-year-old

Canadian teenager who had been the target of

this type of behavior. His cyberstalking, threats, and

sextortion demand reportedly persisted for more

than a year in some cases, according to the lawsuit

[23].

Sexting - Sexting is a combination of the words

"sex" and "texting." Although this etymology ties

exchanging one's own sexually explicit text

messages, photos, or videos via a computer, mobile

device, and/or the internet [7][8]. Sexting has

repeatedly been connected to harmful and risky

behaviors. Unauthorized sext distribution to a larger

audience that was not intended to be the target

audience for such content poses one potentially

major concern. Sharing content can take place in a

variety of ways, including sending it via email, and

posting it online. This might cause reputational

content makes male teenagers feel more popular in

their peer group. Contrarily, involvement in sexting

behavior is often linked with humiliation and

reputational damage [7].

5 Guidelines to better protect children

Being their children's guardians and supervisors,

parents also play a significant role in teaching

children about the possible dangers associated with

social networks and educating them on how to

safeguard their privacy and security online.

of the threats that target children on OSNs, gives

brief descriptions of threats by including cases and

offers guidelines on how to safeguard children's

privacy and security in the context of

networking platforms. This topic will be

explored further in the future and include other

types of risks and threats children face on OSN

platforms, such as children’s exposure to

inappropriate content, dangerous risks that

derive from unsafe trends present on some OSN

[14] 10 tips Teens can stay safe online. UNICEF.

[16] BBC. Instagram biggest for child grooming

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47410520.

[17] BBC. Amanda Todd: Dutch man convicted of

[21] Written By Ben Pilkington . “All the Statistics

[23] “California Man Arrested for Cyberstalking