IT’S a sobering thought that the internet is barely 20 years old. Whether you celebrate its approaching age of majority or shudder at the consequences of its upbringing, there is no question that it has changed fundamentally the way individuals and nations communicate.

It’s a revolution which has permeated way beyond the original tech-savvy west with pandemic proportions, with two billion subscribers now online, and 250 million in China alone, though access through the great firewall of China can take some doing.

At a global level, www represents both an opportunity and a threat. It empowers ordinary citizens to participate in world affairs. Following the disputed elections in Iran at the end of last year, when demonstrations broke out on the streets and foreign journalists were banned, ordinary web subscribers simply sent out information by the cyber-sackful.

The main benefit of the web is that it does not emanate from a single source, so cannot easily be targeted. But seen from the opposite side, it is as slippery and threatening as a clandestine terrorist network.

Cyber wars are possible, too. You can freeze out a country by bombarding it with requests for information, thereby sending its links into meltdown. Back in 2008, Russian hackers effectively isolated the Ukraine. Businessmen simply couldn’t make external transactions; commerce was put on hold.

Last week, the BBC World Service published the results of a major survey in 26 countries which concluded that 80 per cent of people reckon that access to the world wide web should be a fundamental universal right. Finland already recognises online access as a human right.

But with rights come responsibilities. Sadly, the media focus recently has been not on the liberating benefits of the net, but on the wilful abuse of its power to communicate with the impressionable and vulnerable.

Indeed, over the past few weeks we have seen a catalogue of examples of personal suffering and tragedy: a 15-year-old girl who jumped from a road bridge to her death after being bullied by classmates who posted accusations against her on Facebook; a British teacher working for a school in Muslim-strict Abu Dhabi who took her own life in fear that indecent photos posted online could land her in jail; homes wrecked by marauding teenagers crashing house-parties after invitations had been distributed on a variety of social networking sites; to say nothing of a cruel vendetta against an innocent man falsely identified as the jailed child-killer Jon Venables; rumours of amorous rifts in the marriage of the president of France and his first lady; and reports of children being paid by unscrupulous manufacturers for advertising junk food among their social networking chit-chat.

Barely a week ago we were confronted with the tragic story of the grooming and subsequent murder of a 17-year-old girl by her cyber friend, who turned out to be a serial rapist. It served to illustrate the danger of unrealistic expectations of ‘friends’ with nothing in common but a keyboard and internet connection.

The issue is no stranger to our own shores. Earlier this year, when sentencing a Newcastle lecturer for sexually abusing a local teenager whom he had befriended on the internet, the judge in the case remarked: ‘This case sadly shows the dangers of unsupervised use of chat rooms by young persons.’

In Jersey it is estimated that more than half the Island’s schoolchildren, many as young as five, have internet access, while half of those between eight and 11 have their own social networking site, which they use without supervision. Name, age, photos, address, hobbies – harmless, perhaps, in the privacy of a chat room, but potentially dangerous when broadcast to the wider world and possibly leading to prying, bullying and ‘grooming’ .

It is not difficult to identify the symptoms of a growing addiction to the PC screen, with adults and children alike drifting into a tendency to ‘over-share’ information, from tweeting fripperies to revealing important personal details none of which they would dream of exchanging verbally in public, even to the closest of friends.
And far from disappearing into the information stratosphere, once posted, conversations remain accessible; they are what our local data protection adviser calls ‘permanent digital baggage’ which can even influence prospective employment opportunities.

The UK government has taken pages in the national newspapers to advertise its online protection campaign – Zip-it, Block-it, Flag-it, which relies on children alerting parents about material they find upsetting. It’s a tough call, though, with many too worried or scared to call on such reinforcements.

There are others who revel in watching questionable material posted by the irresponsible. Indeed, three Google bosses have been found guilty of violating privacy laws for a video showing cruelty being meted out to a child. Their strident defence citing freedom of expression on the net fell on deaf ears when it was revealed that it took them six months to remove it.

While it may be unrealistic to attempt to curb the spread of the net, there is no reason not to promote responsible use. Unfortunately, regulation tends to result in a longer list of ‘don’ts’ than ‘do’s’ and is therefore unpopular. Restriction, you could argue, goes totally against the ethos of genuine free communication.

The internet has promoted the quick-fix society, the instant response. No longer do we have to learn or absorb anything – just look it up on the web, and while there are still genuine researchers and thinkers in this world, the answer will be there for all to read.

So, given a broad willingness to sign up to an unquestioning acceptance of what is presented on-screen, it’s easy to appreciate the dilemma of trying to persuade vulnerable youngsters not to follow suit.