Copy of Letter sent to Parents/Carers on 11th September 2018

Instagram Group of Grave Concern

This is a letter about Safeguarding

Dear Parents and Carers

I have been contacted by the Lead Safeguarding Officer for Schools in regards to an Instagram group which is a safeguarding risk.

There is an instagram account named, i_know_you_Radcliffe_2

Young people are sending their names to the account holder and then the account holder responds with information including the street the child lives on, the school they attend, the friends they have in school and on their street, names of siblings, relationships etc.  Nothing on any of these accounts are set to private, so anyone can see all this personal information, making the young person very vulnerable to any predators out there who may be accessing this site for the wrong reasons.

The Local Authority have looked into the profile of the administrator and some of the “friends” they are following are very suspect and suggestive of “friends” you would not want a child to be accessing.

When you search the i_know_you_Radcliffe_2 it shows you at the top of the page how many followers the group has, because there are no privacy settings you will be able to see any young person known to  your school.  You can also see the information being openly shared on the messages in response to the child/young person contacting the administrator, there are quite a few Bury schools named, mainly primary.

I have been asked to send this communication to parents of every child at St Luke’s about the importance and seriousness of having accounts for all social media etc set to private.

This Instagram account has been reported to the Local Authority.  I am informing you as part of our school’s safeguarding responsibility to our pupils to make sure that you are aware of the risk this site poses to our children.

Yours sincerely

Miss M Michael

Headteacher