Online October

    After the success of #SafetySeptember, Team YOLO plans to make an extension of our project, i.e., Online Safety Month into the month of October as #OnlineOctober.

    Type: Campaign
    Status: Concluded

    With the expertise that we have gathered in the last few months by working extensively in this area, we have expanded our focus on capacity building of our team. This is enabling us to increase our outreach in terms of spreading awareness about creating safe digital spaces. With #OnlineOctober, we aim to dive deep into the nuances of online safety and digital literacy and provide a much better understanding of Online Safety tools and methods. We have also extended our collaboration with The RK Laxman Foundation. Over the month, we are celebrating ‘Laxman’s Legacy’ by using his creation, The Common Man, to stimulate public consciousness towards online safety.

    The following two initiatives are continuing into #OnlineOctober effectively:

    Online Safety Workshops

    Our expert team has been providing online safety workshops in educational institutions and other organizations to create awareness about establishing a safe digital community online. The number of registrations after the conclusion of #SafetySeptember has increased manifold, and we look forward to expanding our outreach to the remotest parts of the Indian subcontinent. Our workshops are targeted to diverse demographics, and hence the modules that we use to conduct them are curated and customized. We have conducted workshops for students residing in rural India and also for communities of teachers in metropolitan cities. Our demographics vary in terms of geographical spaces, gender, and even age groups. We have put special attention on providing online safety guidelines to women, and for training, we have created curated content on online harassment focusing on the role of different government bodies like NCW in dealing with these instances and also on other modes of legal redressals.

    Laxman Legacy Month

    In collaboration with The RK Laxman Foundation, we are continuing to celebrate Laxman Legacy Month. We are using our social media outreach combined with the satirical approach of Laxman’s cartoons to appeal to a wider audience in a more engaging manner. Through cartoons, we are making more relatable content for our viewers as we focus on issues such as ways to lodge a cyber-crime complaint, spreading awareness about the ills of fake news, the terrible effects of cyber-bullying, the importance of maintaining online privacy, and so on.

    Our Approach

    For #OnlineOctober, Team YOLO is using a data-driven analytical approach, which is focused on using statistics and graphs as a medium to disseminate information. We’re also using tools such as Quizzes to emphasize practical learning.

    Some of the tools which we are using over the period of Online October are as follows:

    PHASE - I

    YOLO Ambassadors

    Aim: To create a wider outreach with our young leaders in every educational institution across India.

    With #OnlineOctober, we are working towards cementing our flagship opportunity for youth changemakers across different educational institutions. These campus ambassadors would be instrumental in generating opportunities for the youth in their institutions, and in turn, furthering our vision and outreach. In furtherance of our goal to spread digital literacy and online safety, we are training our ambassadors in conducting online safety workshops. Certification workshops are being conducted where individuals are getting trained to further knowledge about Online Safety to other community members.

    How are we doing it?

    We have a dedicated in-house team of experts to conduct these Online Safety workshops in different institutions and organizations. Only after going through an extensive course that includes a rigorous system of feedback and presentations, our experts receive their certification that equips and enables them to conduct these workshops.

    Individual Action Week

    Aim: Capacity building of interns and our audiences. Through the secondary research that our interns are conducting, they are gaining more knowledge about the nuances of Online Safety. They are also learning the basics of video making in the process.

    Individual Action Week was all about taking action towards our collective goal every day. During the second week of October, our interns spent 5 days completing tasks, which had a tangible impact on their personal safety in online spaces. On the completion of the period, our interns were equipped with a basic toolkit that enabled them to use the digital space more safely and productively. They received a complete understanding of the privacy settings of social media platforms; they knew how to report cybercrime, and also how to spot fake news. Simultaneously, we created tutorial videos for non-members to learn about the nuances of safe online spaces. Our interns did in-depth research during this week to know more about navigating safely online. They also made tutorial videos in their native languages talking about different kinds of online safety issues to reach out to a wider population set. We have made videos in 28+ regional languages of India to reach our diverse population. Through the research that our interns conducted, it was not only them, but it was also their family members who could benefit. There’s no end to knowledge, and we are trying to educate as many as possible on the importance and the urgency of knowing how to operate safely online.

    Tweet Chat

    Aim: Public engagement enabling people to gain more knowledge about multiple aspects of Online Safety through the process of participation.

    To raise awareness for Safety September, we conducted a Tweet Chat on diverse strands of Online Safety. After receiving a positive response from our members and our audience, and trending at number 5 on Twitter in September, we conducted phase 2 of our Tweet Chat. Questions on Online Safety were shared from our Twitter handle, and our members and audiences actively participated in answering them.

    On 9th October 2020, our team organized a tweet chat raising the topic of cyber-bullying in India. We worked in collaboration with Twitter to focus public attention on Bullying Prevention Month, a campaign taken up by Twitter to throw light on the effects of cyber-bullying. People participated in large numbers and our YOLO team made 4900+ tweets using the designated hashtag #BullyingPreventionMonth. The topic for the tweet chat was cyberbullying, and questions were mainly focused on its various facets, such as its forms, its long-lasting effects, methods of preventing it, etc. A poll based on witnessing or being a victim of cyberbullying was also put up, to which people answered actively.

    PHASE - II

    Quiz

    Aim: To create an engaging platform for the digital community to disseminate knowledge in an efficient manner.

    Through infographics, we created interactive open quizzes on Instagram for the online community. The quiz tested participants on various aspects of online safety ranging from general topics such as cybercrime, hate speech, etc., to advanced topics such as ransomware, end-to-end encryption, etc. Through this activity, we increased awareness and digital literacy in a fun and engaging manner for our audience.

    Conclave

    Aim: To start a discourse on the evolving nature, the bright, and the dark side of the Digital World. Students, Colleges, and eminent speakers, who are experts on Online safety, came together to participate and engage in this conclave.

    This conference effectively concluded the #OnlineOctober campaign. It was a hub for enthusiasts and new learners of Online Safety. Their diverse backgrounds, expertise, and experience that this conference brought together, provided us with a kaleidoscopic understanding of the newest digital challenges and probable solutions to them. Through multiple competitions, events and panel discussions conducted by esteemed speakers, we initiated a public discourse on the importance of online safety.