DOJ provides guidelines for online classes to protect students during online classes

The Department of Justice’s Office of Cybercrime has issued guidelines for the conduct of online classes to make sure of the safety and protection of children from possible security breaches and exposure to harmful content.

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President Rodrigo Duterte approved the Department of Education’s recommendation to reset the opening of classes to October 5. No face-to-face classes will be allowed when the classes start, while sessions will be limited to online sessions.

While video conferencing services open doors to new opportunities that make access to education easy, application of information and communication technology in the conduct of online classes can cause many security risks, such as loss of confidentiality, availability, and integrity of computer data, as well as the exposure of students to abusive strangers and harmful online contents,

the DOJ said in its advisory.

The guidelines which were issued by the DOJ-OOC through its Officer-in-Charge lawyer Charito Zamora, are for parents, school administrators and the public in general.

Here are the guidelines the DOJ crafted for the conduct of online classes:

• School administrators are advised to never share meeting room credentials, both the ID and the password to the public

Meetings are advised to be set as follows:

• Accept participants’ request to join individually
• Provide a standard naming instruction for participants, such as: SURNAME, first name, middle initial
• Start meeting with participant's video camera turned off
• Require password from participants
• Mute participants upon entry
• Disable desktop/screen share for participants who are not assigned as hosts of the meeting

The DOJ said that participants must be prohibited from renaming themselves, sending messages to each other, accessing file transfers, and sharing their screens and whiteboards during meetings. They will also not be allowed to replace their background image.

Students should also not be allowed to be alone in the virtual classroom. A school administrator must be always present for supervision.

The DOJ also advised educators to always update the application being used. 

Every service/application connected to the internet is vulnerable to cyber-attacks. It is crucial that users regularly update their apps once it is available,” 

it added.

As for the parents, the DOJ-OOC said they must teach their children to be discerning of information and contents online to reduce their risk of falling victim to online abuse and cyber-attacks.

Parents are encouraged to promote and implement proper etiquettes to be observed by children under their supervision. There is still no substitute for parental involvement and supervision when it comes to digital literacy and good cyber citizenship,

it added.

Meanwhile, the DOJ-OOC advised the public to immediately report any irregularities or unwanted incidents during the conduct of online classes to law enforcement agencies so that it can be properly investigated.