Pornography and online violence across children in Romania: 25.7% of children questioned received sexual images online 

In the last year, 25.7% of the children in Romania questioned by the EU Kids Online II declared that they received messages or messages with a sexual content online. 12.2% of the kids were bothered/ harassed online and 11.4% of them met offline with a person they met online. The result are part of a European investigation, EU Kids Online II, financed by the European Commission and started in 2010. A part of the conclusions of the study were presented on Wednesday in the European Parliament.

The study’s aim was to investigate the risks that children using the internet are exposed to. The project is financed by the EC and coordinated by Sonia Livingstone, professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science. The investigation took place across 25 EU countries where 23,420 children using internet were interviewed including one of their parents.

The children were aged between 9 to 16. Here are some of the conclusions of the study related to Romania. In the last year, 25.7% of the children received messages or images with sexual content on the internet and 43.3% of the children that received such messages on the internet were bothered by the fact.

Of the 12.2% of the children who declared that they were bothered/harassed online, 47.1% were a little upset, 26.7% were upset and 16% were very upset. 11.4% of the children met offline with a person that they met online but only 2.5% of the children said they were bothered of the meeting. 75.2% of the children met new persons online, on the messenger while 18.5% on a social network, 8.3% in a chat and 7.2% in an e-mail.