The National Crime Agency’s Anti-Cyber Crime Campaign is Embarrassing and Ignorant

The National Crime Agency embarked on an appalling advertising campaign yesterday “aimed at educating the parents of 12-15 year old boys” who might be proponents of cyber-crime. Already we can see the ignorance flowing here, as focusing on the male gender is incorrect, and targeting such a narrow age range seems completely ludicrous. Not only that, the organization created a checklist for parents to help investigate their own children and see if they are engaging in illegal activity. This is a prior warning, the compiled list is possibly the biggest pile of nonsense I’ve read in years.

“Warning signs of cyber crime

The following behaviours may indicate a young person is at risk of getting involved in cyber crime:

• Is your child spending all of their time online?
• Are they interested in coding? Do they have independent learning material on computing?
• Do they have irregular sleeping patterns?
• Do they get an income from their online activities, do you know why and how?
• Are they resistant when asked what they do online?
• Do they use the full data allowance on the home broadband?
• Have they become more socially isolated?

If a young person is showing some of these signs try and have a conversation with them about their online activities. This will allow you to assess their computer knowledge proficiency so you can understand what they are doing, explain the consequences of cyber crime and help them make the right choices.”

There’s so much wrong with the questions above that I really don’t know where to start. The idea that children spending time online is a negative concept is unbelievably outdated, and laughable. The internet is an integral part of daily life from educational activities to keeping up with friends on various social media platforms. Additionally, human beings don’t all have to be brash, loudmouth extroverts, and social isolation isn’t anything to be suspicious off. In reality, many socially isolated people are very creative and struggle to communicate with people. Anxiety is a terrible condition to deal with its impossible for non-sufferers to understand the daily torment. That’s why it’s incredibly hurtful to judge people and be suspicious of them just because they want alone time.

On another note, the one key profession society will need in the future is programmers, and they are in short supply at the high skill level. We should be actively encouraging children to attain coding skills and make their interest in this field flourish. To insinuate this passion as a negative aspect is frankly, embarrassing.

Hilariously, the NCA contradicts themselves and goes onto say:

Ways to use cyber skills positively

Skills in coding, gaming, computer programming, cyber security or anything IT-related are in high demand and there are many careers and opportunities available to anyone with an interest in these areas.”

According to their impeccable logic (insert sarcasm here), coding is a suspicious trait but it’s a way to use skills in a positive manner. If anyone can explain what the marketing team has been drinking, I’d love to know. This entire campaign makes zero sense and is a complete farce. While some feel the need to ridicule it, I find it very worrying that people in power have such an idiotic and uneducated viewpoint on the subject matter. As previously mentioned, the government, the actors, and anyone else involved in this mess should feel ashamed.

If you’re brave enough, here’s the cringe-worthy video in full: