by Keya Nijhawan
The internet has taken over the world. Just like love! And just like love, it has the potential for good and evil. Everywhere you look, someone is looking at a screen, whether it is a phone, laptop, iPad, or tv. Sometimes you may even look around and think someone is just checking the time, but they are actually texting someone on their watch, which has a screen and is synced to their phone.
With everyone always looking at a screen, we may think we know where the internet could lead us, but this is far from the truth. The internet is endless, and it is very easy to get lost. We are all guilty of scrolling for hours on different apps and websites while losing track of time.
Therefore, Safer Internet Day is a necessity. And if you aren’t interested in celebrating Valentine’s Day, it offers a worthy alternative.
According to European Commission, the goal of Safer Internet Day is to raise awareness for all the opportunities the internet can provide while also advocating for protection and empowerment for young people and children online.
Safer Internet Day (SID if you want to be cool) was celebrated for the first time on February 6th, 2004. In 2004, SID was celebrated in only 14 different countries; today, SID is celebrated all over the world in 180 different countries.
For SID 2020, the European Commission hosted a focus group on the potential development and implementation of Artificial Intelligence. As discussed in Artificial Intelligence Focus Group Recap, the group focused on the abilities of AI. There were different workshops, one of which was led by Jos Flury from ZiuZ, ICCAM ( International Congress on Computational and Applied Mathematics). A key discussion centered around “the need to define more specifically what we want AI to do.” Participants expressed ideas for solutions to overcome “soft barriers” to the application of AI.
Overall, there is much time and energy that has gone into putting SID together, and there are definitely many moving parts since SID is not celebrated on the same day every year.
Also, if Safer Internet Day does not have an interesting enough name for you to take the time and celebrate, maybe their slogan will be the stick that breaks you, “Together for a better internet.”
Valentine’s Day…Safer Internet Day…it’s all about togetherness, and not getting screwed over, by humans…or AI.
