Government launches internet safety code for children

"Zip it, block it, flag it" is the slogan for the campaign, which advises young people to keep their personal details private online and to block and report anyone who is threatening them on the internet.

The strategy, which was developed by the UK Council for Child Internet Safety, includes measures to make online safety a compulsory part of the curriculum for children aged five and up from 2011.

The announcement comes as new research shows that almost a fifth of young people have been exposed to harmful or inappropriate content online. A third of children also think their parents have no idea what they do when they are online.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he hopes that "zip it, block it, flag it" will become as familiar to this generation as "stop, look, listen" did to the last.

He said: "The internet provides our children with a world of entertainment, opportunity and knowledge – a world literally at their fingertips. But we must ensure that the virtual world is as safe for them as this one."

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, Europe’s largest teaching union, said internet service providers (ISPs), not schools, should do more to filter offensive materials so that children are not exposed to inappropriate websites.

She said: "We need to ask ourselves whether it is schools that should take the responsibility for fire-fighting measures, or whether such a responsibility should rest on the shoulders of ISPs for tackling the publication of offensive material at source."