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Kathryn Harnish

Dr. Bulent Dogan

CUIN 6320

10 December 2022

Individualized Technology Project: Digital Security and Safety for High Schoolers

As a high school teacher, I am constantly overhearing my students talk about using social

media and other aspects of the digital world. I am often worried by what I hear. My students are

not always knowledgeable on how to keep themselves safe digitally, so I decided that my focus

for this project would be compiling a list of ten digital security topics that high schools should be

integrating into their curriculum across grades and contents in order to help students protect

themselves. Here are my Top 10 Topics to Teach High School Students About Digital Security

and Safety:

1. Passwords - importance of creating strong passwords and storing them safely

2. Navigating social media - protecting privacy and posting safely and appropriately

3. Data mining - who is involved and how does it affect high schoolers

4. Location services - what features are safe to use and which aren’t

5. Viruses - identifying suspicious messages and links

6. Pictures and videos - what is safe to share, where and how

7. Meeting people online - staying safe when making friends digitally

8. Cyberbullying - what to do if witnessing or experiencing cyberbullying

9. Privacy Settings - how security measures can be violated even if you think you’re being

careful
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10. Digital footprint - how to monitor and a maintain a “clean” digital footprint

The ten topics I chose to include in my list can mostly be categorized as protecting a

student’s physical safety or protecting their personal information, though some topics deal with

both. Location services, for example, if misused can put a person in physical danger. I included

this topic because many apps, like Snapchat and Instagram, allow people to share their location

when posting. Having a person’s location information poses potential dangers, like what one

writer indicated in Security Magazine: “In the hands of a malicious actor, such insights can

facilitate physical tracking, blackmail, the outing of deeply held secrets and more” (Fong, 2021).

Most students I know do not think about these implications; they just want to show off to their

friends where they are and what they are doing. This idea directly connects with the second topic

on my list, navigating social media. Many of the things people post on social media can reveal

information that the wrong person could use to harm them. Most young people are not naturally

aware of these potential dangers, so educators should be stepping in to rectify that.

Another topic that could have physical ramifications, though maybe not dangerous ones,

is not maintaining a “clean” digital footprint. As high schoolers get older, they start to look for

jobs and apply to college. Many of them have heard stories of colleges not accepting or

rescinding offers to students based on things they have posted to social media, but not all

students know how to check what others can see of their online presence. While of course it

would be much better to not post anything questionable at all, students should be taught how to

look into their own digital footprint in order to monitor their own online presence. One education

website encourages students to “perform an exhaustive data mine on themselves once a quarter”

(AGParts Education, 2021). Once students know how to perform these checks on their digital
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footprints, they should also be taught how to clean them up when they find something they do

not like.

I included the following topics to help students learn how to secure sensitive personal

information: passwords, data mining, pictures and videos, meeting people online, and privacy

settings. One important thing students understand is how critical it is to have strong passwords

for accounts that have their personal information. They should also understand the potential

dangers of websites and apps saving their passwords. Data mining is becoming more and more

prevalent, and many students are unaware of what this looks like and can mean for them. An

article in The New York Times states that, “the data collected by the vast majority of products

people use every day isn’t regulated” (Klosowski, 2021). Because of this, data breaches are

frequent and personal information can be compromised. Students need to learn how to protect

themselves from this as much as possible. Another aspect of protecting one’s privacy is being

careful about posting pictures and videos to social media. An article from NPR discussing

parents posting photos of their children mentions the concept of “digital kidnapping,” where a

person can take a photo from a social media account and use it as their own (Haelle, 2016). This

is just one of the dangers of posting photos of yourself; it can also give criminals a lot of context

about your life that could lead to them stealing your identity information. Because so many high

school students use picture-based social media apps, it is very important that they are taught

about these potential consequences. Using the strictest form of privacy settings on apps is the

best way to protect yourself, other than just not posting at all. Students should be made aware of

how to adjust privacy settings and to stay updated on when those settings change and erase their

preferences.
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Other things students need to be educated on are cyberbullying, meeting people online,

and avoiding viruses and phishing. By high school, many students are already aware of what

cyberbullying is, but not all of them know what to do if experiencing or witnessing it. The

website, Stopbullying.gov, states that about 16% of high school students experience

cyberbullying (2021). Specific instruction on what to do in varying situations of cyberbullying is

important in keeping students safe and protecting their mental health. In addition to learning

about cyberbullying, students should also be given guidance on meeting people and making

friends online. Due to online gaming and social media, many young people make friends that

they only ever talk to online. Without meeting someone in person, you can never be sure that

they are who they say they are, so sharing personal information or listening to everything they

say is risky. Students need to be made aware of the potential risks involved in this. Lastly,

students also need to be taught how to identify suspicious messages and links that may lead to

viruses that could affect their hardware or compromise their personal information. Email scams

in particular have become very convincing, especially for young people who do not know what

to look for. In order to protect them, we should be teach them the signs to look for.
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References

AGParts Education. (2021, July 29). Internet safety for high school students: 5 tips: Agparts

education. AGParts Education. Retrieved from

https://agpartseducation.com/internet-safety-for-high-school-students-5-tips/

Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs (ASPA). (2021, November 5). What is cyberbullying.

StopBullying.gov. Retrieved from https://www.stopbullying.gov/cyberbullying/what-is-it

Fong, M. (2021, November 19). The unforeseen risks of sharing smartphone location data.

Security Magazine RSS. Retrieved from

https://www.securitymagazine.com/articles/96557-the-unforeseen-risks-of-sharing-smartphone-

location-data

Haelle, T. (2016, October 28). Do parents invade children's privacy when they post photos

online? NPR. Retrieved from

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/10/28/499595298/do-parents-invade-childrens-

privacy-when-they-post-photos-online

Klosowski, T. (2021, September 6). The State of Consumer Data Privacy Laws in the Us (And

Why It Matters). The New York Times. Retrieved from

https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/state-of-privacy-laws-in-us/.