For the Level 2 students at the ICT institute, as part of the Personal Development Unit, the second semester kicked off with a very interesting lecture delivered by the Cyber Crime Unit of the Malta Police Force with the name “Safe Internet Use”.
Having flair, and set to make a career in IT entails spending a considerable amount of time using the pc and the internet. Like many other things, the internet, if not used well can be very harmful. Consequently, the aim of this lecture was to help ICT students to stir away from ‘unsafe use of the internet’ and to bring awareness to common pitfalls which can lead to self-harm as well as harm to others. Issues covered in this lecture were, Distribution of Illegal and Inappropriate Material, Fraud and Financial Risk, Information Security, and Manipulation of Data.
Having a teenage audience, examples from each issue covered in the lecture were backed up with content that teenagers can relate to. One particular example from ‘Manipulation of Data’ was that pranks and jokes like entering a friend’s facebook page and posting messages/material pretending to be him/her (because s/he left the pc unlocked whilst s/he answered a phone call) is considered a crime with a fine up to €23, 000 and a prison sentence up to 4 years.
For more information, clarifications, questions or difficulties The Cyber Crime Unit can be contacted on 22942231 or by email on computer.crime@gov.mt.