ARFor this year’s Safer Internet Day, we joined forces with Liverpool FC to stream a live event via the UK Safer Internet Centre Youtube channel to talk about reliability online.
Young people, teachers and parents from all over the UK were gathered round, watching the Youtube event countdown, trying to guess who they might see from Liverpool FC talk about online safety and the theme of reliability online for this year’s Safer Internet Day. When the live feed started there were 6154 attendees who were all excited to see the reds support such a fantastic day.
Liverpool FC Talk Online Safety
The event started with an introduction from our very own Ken Corish (Online Safety Director for SWGfL) and a welcome from the live panel of presenters including Carmel Glassbrook (Professionals Online Safety Helpline Practitioner) and Andrew Williams (UKSIC Online Safety Consultant).
After a quick breakdown of the importance of Safer Internet Day, we went straight over to Anfield Stadium to meet Mighty Red himself. Throughout the event he showed everyone the ins and outs of the stadium, from the pitch itself to an exclusive behind the scenes look at the dressing room with all the famous players’ shirts that hung on the wall. He ended with running through the players’ pitch entrance which made us all feel like we were running onto the pitch ourselves!
The event also had a live assembly which got everyone thinking about reliability online. There were some questions put forward which asked the children to decide whether to trust or check certain scenarios. The engagement throughout showed that young people were learning about the theme for the day with plenty of answers and discussions coming in!
We then got to meet some of the team who each had their own online safety messages to talk about. We met Liverpool FC legend Jamie Carragher, Director of the LFC foundation Matt Parish and CEO of LFC Billy Hogan. We then got to hear from some of the players including Adrián San Miguel del Castillo, Rylee Foster, Neco Williams and Tom Hunt who all talked about the importance of reliability online.
Throughout the event we asked the audience to put forward their own questions about trust online so our panel of live presenters could answer them throughout the stream. We had plenty coming forward with Ken, Carmel and Andrew giving advice to some great questions such as: When do I tell my parents I’m concerned about something? Can I trust anything online? There were also direct questions about whether to trust specific companies. All our presenters discussed in great detail the questions that were put forward with plenty of advice and guidance throughout.
Spreading The Message
Overall, the event brought together thousands of young people to discuss the importance of reliability online. With Liverpool’s wide appeal and fantastic support, we managed to reach an extraordinary number of attendees for the day.
Ken Corish said:
We were truly overwhelmed by the whole support we received on the day. To have over 6000 people sharing the event with us was amazing. We truly realise the potential of streaming technologies to engage a wide audience with important online safety messages. We can only thank our friends and colleagues at Liverpool football club for backing this initiative and supporting it so well. Perhaps for next safer Internet Day we can actually be at Anfield itself streaming the event there live. That would be something.
Forbes Duff, Senior Manager CSR, Liverpool FC, said:
It’s amazing that we were able to reach more people than ever with this year’s virtual event despite the current difficult circumstances. This is the sixth year we have worked alongside the fantastic team at UK Safer Internet Centre to stage engaging events that provide young people with the essential tools they need to stay safe online.
I hope that next year we will be able to welcome everyone back to Anfield to celebrate Safer Internet Day 2022.
The event is still available to watch via the UK Safer Internet Centre Youtube channel which has already amassed over 21,000 views. If you didn’t manage to make it on the day, make sure you get a chance to watch the team, Mighty Red and our team of experts talk about trust online for this year’s Safer Internet Day.
