Student cybersecurity education initiative launched

The police are collaborating with the Education Bureau, Hong Kong Education City, and Qianfan Technology to equip schools, teachers, and students with the skills to navigate the digital world securely.

This came after the latest policy address suggested that the city would be enhancing the development of digital education.

The partnership, involving the police’s CyberDefender, aims at enhancing students’ digital literacy and even their AI literacy in ethical use of arti-ficial intelligence. It will introduce creative tools such as board game competitions to make cybersecurity education engaging, particularly for upper primary and junior secondary students, fostering a generation capable of responsibly handling online risks in an increasingly connected world.

The initiative will also tackle cybersecurity on mul-tiple fronts to ensure comprehensive protection.

Speaking to Sing Tao Daily – sister publication of The Standard – Chief Superintendent Raymond Lam Cheuk-ho of the police’s Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau said schools face challenges in maintaining up-to-date cybersecurity measures due to limited resources, leaving them vulnerable to cyber threats.

To address this, police are working with the government and business sectors, as well as the Hong Kong Internet Registration Corporation and PricewaterhouseCoopers, to conduct cybersecurity assessments and provide tailored administrative guide-lines for schools, faculties and students.

These efforts help schools establish secure digital environments, reducing risks of data breaches and cyberattacks.

For educators, police are also working with the Association of IT Leaders in Education to orga-nize training workshops, empowering teachers to safeguard school networks and effectively impart cybersecurity knowledge to their students, creating a ripple effect of awareness.

Students, particularly the tech-savvy Generation Z who frequently engage with AI tools, are a key focus.

The program highlights the dangers of technologies such as deepfakes, which can manipulate media, and AI systems that may expose privacy or legal vulnerabilities if misused.

To make learning interactive, the police joined hands with the government bureaus’ mascots to form CyberDefender alliance in launching a board game competition featuring attack and defense flashcards, encouraging teamwork at district and regional levels to teach cyber threat awareness in a fun, engaging way.

Building on past successes, the police and Education Bureau have developed teaching resources on tech crimes, digital asset risks, and emerging tech-nologies, reaching over a thousand educators through workshops over the past three academic years. Both the police and the Education Bureau aim to enhance cross-sector collaboration to comprehensively improve students’ digital literacy and nurture outstanding talent in innovation and technology.