A RECENT study in the United Kingdom found that restricting children's activities on the Internet did not just reduce the risk of them finding pornography.

It also limited their exposure to learning opportunities and information online.

Findings like these shaped the thinking of the Advisory Council on the Impact of New Media (Aims) in calling for more resources to be poured into helping teachers, parents and children themselves deal with challenges posed by the Internet.

Short-term solutions like filters are helpful, the 13-member council noted.

But education is key to tackling the high-priority concern of protecting minors from such dangers as online sexual predators, addiction and cyber-bullying.

To shape and spread such education, Aims feels a coordinating agency is needed. It should comprise public- and private-sector representatives. One of its tasks would be to draw up a national Internet safety strategy, to tackle online dangers holistically.

The agency should engage regularly with minors, parents and teachers, and even consider an advisory panel of digitally-savvy youth, Aims said.

It would also administer a national fund for efforts to protect minors, which the Government and digital industry players should contribute to.

Aims also recommends that filtering services be promoted and sponsored, that more local research be done on ways to protect minors, and that groups here work with overseas partners facing similar issues.

Such efforts, the council said, are more urgent now, as more children go online at a younger age, and more often, through mobile phones.

Read the full story in Saturday's edition of The Straits Times.