Today marks the seventh edition of the event. Celebrations are taking in more than 60 countries on all 5 continents across the world, from Canada to South Korea, and Russia to Kenya and including all 27 countries of the European Union.

“Online safety concerns all of us. Young people across Europe spend a good part of their leisure time, playing, interacting and learning on the web. The overall traffic on social networking sites has grown enormously over the last three years,” said Viviane Reding, patron of Safer Internet Day for the sixth consecutive year, European Commissioner for Information Society and Media. “Therefore, it is even more our responsibility as Europeans to make the online world a safe and secure environment that everyone can enjoy.

Safer Internet Day 2010 celebrates the theme “Think B4 U Post”. Once an image is posted online, it’s hard, if not impossible, to take it back. Anyone can see it. The goal is not to prevent young people from using these sites, but to make them aware of the risks of sharing personal information online and to encourage them to control their online identity by thinking carefully about the consequences.

Safer Internet Day 2010 will also mark the launch of the web version of the highly popular eSafety toolkit (www.esafetykit.net) developed by Insafe in collaboration with Liberty Global Inc. and supported by the European Commission. Localised versions for Ireland, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Austria, Netherlands, Spain, Romania and Belgium are now online, and more language versions will become available in the coming months, offering an indispensable resource for parents, teachers and librarians throughout Europe and beyond.

Visit website www.saferinternet.org to get tips on how to protect your privacy online. To learn more about Safer Internet Day meetings in your region or at the international level this year, stay posted at: www.saferinternetday.org and check out the SID fair www.sidfair.org. Further information:

About Insafe

Insafe is the European Safer Internet awareness-raising network co-funded by the European Commission and coordinated by European Schoolnet. It comprises national centres in 25 countries across the European Union and in Iceland and Norway, with partner organisations in Argentina, Australia and the USA. Insafe aims at empowering users to benefit from the positive aspects of internet whilst avoiding the potential risks. Further information is available at www.saferinternet.org or contact info-insafe@eun.org. About Safer Internet Day

Safer Internet Day is part of a global drive by awareness-raising partners to promote a safer Internet for all users, especially young people. It is organised by INSAFE in the framework of the European Commission’s Safer Internet Programme. www.saferinternetday.org