Kamakshi, Vivekananda Institute of Professional Studies
Introduction
The digital age has brought forth prominent changes in the lives of people in many spheres by offering them numerous opportunities in the education sector and IT sector inter alia, which has left a special mark in the lives of children. This integration of new technology in the lives of children had a positive impact by making it easy to access information. However, it also opened a can of worms by making children more prone or vulnerable to a comparatively newer form of offense known as ‘cyberbullying’. Consequently, it becomes a priority to bring legal policy frameworks to tackle the challenge that has been presented to us by the coming of the ‘Digital Age’.
Children and the Digital Age
In order to first access the interaction between children and the digital age, we need to be first familiarized with the term ‘child’ in its legal sense. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child[i] defines a child as any human being who is below the age of 18 years or who has not yet reached 18 years of age. In relation to the subject of the digital age and its impact on children, India also follows the same definition for a child, i.e., any person who is below the age of 18 years.
Serious advancements in technology have indeed brought forth fruitful impacts, including access to the giant sea of knowledge and information about educational resources like the introduction to new online platforms, which significantly improve the quality of education among children, but this shine of newfound technological advances cannot hide the darkness that lurks underneath it. This darkness is poised with numerous challenges or issues that act as a constraint in the usage of new technology.
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