Cybersecurity Education for Children and Adolescents in Finland : A Study in Finnish Schools
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Lataukset505
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Along with the advancement of technology and the rising need for safety and security in the lives and
education has raised concerns regarding cybersecurity knowledge and awareness. This thesis focuses
on the cybersecurity education of students in Finnish schools. Interviewing teachers and cybersecurity
professionals are done to gain insight, whether the current cybersecurity education in the existing
curricula is enough, and how it could be improved.
While children and adolescents spend a considerable time for entertainment purposes, their
lack of understanding and awareness of cybersecurity risks is evident based on the research done in the
thesis, and in the existing cybersecurity related literature. This thesis aims to categorize the findings
based on the interviews into three different categories regarding what, when, and how cybersecurity
knowledge and safety should be included in the cybersecurity and ICT education.
The findings based on the interviews show that the most common key concerns regarding
cybersecurity topics. In addition, children and adolescents should be monitored, however, the way of
monitoring needs to be done by the parents to not infringe on the privacy of the youth. The concept of
cybersecurity should be introduced for the youth when they first begin using electronic devices.
Moreover, ICT should be introduced as its own school subject, albeit melded as a part of other
subjects. The modern way of educating cybersecurity to the youth could be done through gamification
(bringing gaming elements into non-gaming contexts), concrete examples, and different types of
educational media.
The cybersecurity and ICT education should be introduced as its own school subject or as a
part of other subjects to prepare them for the future. The education must be done per age category, and
teaching materials must be revised yearly, similarly how other subjects are. However, the educational
system requires teachers and parents to be a part of the education as well, as some of them are not very
knowledgeable regarding cybersecurity and ICT topics. The education system must be done in
cooperation between different municipalities to ensure that everyone gets equal chance for education,
and to avoid inequity that might rise, if not addressed by the Ministry of Education and Culture level.