February 8 2022: Every year, Safer Internet Day arrives in early February to remind us all just how important it is to protect digital experiences in an ever-evolving virtual world. As the event commemorates its 19th year, Zoom takes a look at the people, processes, policies, and products we’ve deployed to help make Zoom a safe space, as well as how we contribute to making the internet a better place as a whole.
Here are a few of the features that are designed to help keep users safe online — which schools can easily deploy for virtual learning:
At-Risk Meeting Notifier: Designed to proactively identify any issues with meeting privacy, this tool scans posts on public social media sites and other public online resources for Zoom Meeting links. If the link to your online classroom link was posted online, Zoom account owners and admins will receive an email notification.
 Approve or block entry to users from specific regions/countries: The feature allows meeting hosts to block participants from certain geographical areas from joining a meeting, so that a virtual classroom is only joined by the relevant students. We find that, in many cases, those disrupting meetings are not from the same area as an account owner.
Waiting Room chat: The Waiting Room is an important feature for securing a Zoom Meeting. Just like it sounds, the Waiting Room is a virtual staging area that stops meeting attendees from joining until the host is ready for them. Participants can also engage with meeting hosts in a two-way chat in the Waiting Room. Hosts can message the entire Waiting Room or specific participants, and attendees can reply back, creating an environment where hosts can vet users to make sure they’re legitimate students before the meeting ever starts.
 Reporting abuse: If someone is disrupting a meeting or online learning session, Zoom offers multiple ways to report abuse. From within a meeting, hosts can report abuse by tapping “Participants” in the meeting controls, selecting the name of the participant they would like to report, then selecting “Remove and Report.”  Hosts can even report instances of abuse after a meeting or webinar ends, by following the instructions in this support article or by filling out our Trust Form.

Other industry opinions/initiatives 
Anthony Di Bello, Vice President, Strategic Development at OpenText: Safer Internet Day has never been more important than this year. The initial cybersecurity scramble caused by the pandemic is now a thing of the past, and businesses and employees everywhere have successfully adapted to the changes it brought. However, in 2022, we face a new problem: remaining secure while hybrid working becomes increasingly more prevalent in our professional lives. 
Employees will continue to connect to corporate networks from a wide variety of devices, via various internet connections ranging from home networks, café Wi-Fi and offices. And so far, cybercriminals have been taking full advantage: with a triple digit increase in cyberattacks seen in the first half of last year alone. The threat of ransomware, impact of misinformation, and phishing scams should be top of mind for information security professionals, employees, and consumers alike.
Awareness and a basic understanding of the threats is the basis for the importance of Safer Internet Day in 2022. An increased focus on ensuring that security is front-and-centre of both consumers’ and employees’ minds. Putting cybersecurity at the top of their list of priorities – keeping themselves and the businesses they work for safe. 
Olyx initiatives
The fourth edition of the OLX 2022 Safer Internet Day Study intends to foster awareness among online users, thereby helping make the Internet a better and safer space for everyone. It seeks to understand the cyber safety preparedness and level of awareness among Indian users, and highlight opportunity areas to create a safer and inclusive Internet for everyone, to mark the occasion of International Safer Internet Day.
The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) CRIME IN INDIA 2020; VOL II released in September 2021, India recorded 50,035 cases of cyber crime with a 11.8 percent increase over the previous year. The rate of cyber crimes (incidents per lakh population) also surged from 3.3 in 2019 to 3.7 in 2020.
The study revealed that over three-fourths of all respondents experienced at least one online fraud during the pandemic. Within this, financial frauds topped the list, with half  (47%) of all respondents having faced it. Online shopping stands out as the top activity that makes respondents feel most vulnerable or unsafe on the Internet (36%), followed by use of social media (20%). In the age group of 50 and above, online content consumption is cited as potentially unsafe by 1 in 5 respondents (19%).
“Internet usage has seen a more than steep rise as people have been confined to their homes, and almost all activities or part thereof has moved online - education, shopping, banking, content consumption. This has led to a significant increase in screen time across age groups” said Amit Kumar, CEO, OLX Autos India, “Safer Internet Day highlights the netizens’ online experience, their understanding and awareness of cyber security and safe online behaviour, and challenges that need to be addressed. Our intent through this annual study is to get a first-hand account of the netizens’ changing digital behaviour, and provide them with the right measures to safeguard their online presence.”
Need for digital detox
A former partner at McKinsey & Company, Helen Lee Bouygues has helped transform more than 25 firms. She writes: Whether it be doom scrolling on Twitter, listening to podcast after podcast, or checking in on every last news alert, what researchers call “information overload” has become a widespread problem, especially for young people whose habits have developed in the smartphone era.
A recent study revealed teens spend nearly eight hours a day in front of a screen, doubling their pre-pandemic estimates. We have fallen into a state of “information overload” and media addiction, which is a widespread problem. Young people are particularly vulnerable to social media in ways that very negatively impact well-being and mental health. Ahead of this year’s Safer Internet Day, which aims to create a better online space, we must look for ways to practice safe social media usage and think more critically about our relationship to the news. 
GoDaddy comment
Nikhil Arora, Vice President, and Managing Director, GoDaddy India: The global pandemic necessitated many SMEs to take their businesses online, thereby requiring them to also pay attention to security for their business websites, helping to protect them from vulnerabilities and threats. This makes it critical for SMEs to choose their hosting partners carefully for those that can provide a more secure online experience, including for example: security tools, system updates, password protection and monitors their websites continuously. We at GoDaddy, offers both 24/7 monitoring and quick response time, along with solutions, which includes anti-virus, anti–spam and firewall protections for optimum safety. Moreover, our services include comprehensive protection through Website Security, SSL Certificates, Back-up & Restore, Firewall, and CDN as a bundled security solution package for budding businesses. These prominent security solutions help build greater customer trust as it demonstrates the website and business legitimacy. GoDaddy continues to support Indian small businesses and entrepreneurs with an integrated suite of online tools and solutions with security protections, that are easy to use and affordable.