The Institute of Informatics and Telecommunications (IIT) of the National Centre for Scientific Research DEMOKRITOS (NCSR DEMOKRITOS) focuses on research and development in the areas of Telecommunications, Networks, Web Technologies and Intelligent Systems. The main strategic objective of IIT is to excel in research and innovation required for the development of the knowledge society.

The Software and Knowledge Engineering Laboratory (SKEL) of IIT, which participates as a Network Member in POSCON, focuses on intelligent systems and services for the Web and the Semantic Web, and more specifically: web content collection and extraction for specific thematic areas, knowledge discovery from web usage data, creation and maintenance of ontologies to support the collection and extraction tasks, natural interaction with web-based information systems.

SKEL’s strategy to reach its objectives, during the last years, involved the following:

• coordination or participation in various EC and national funded projects in order to raise the necessary funds to support our research work,
• organisation and participation in numerous international conferences and workshops to present our research results,
• organisation of international summer schools, study abroad programs, seminars, as well as joint PhD programs with Universities in other countries, and participation in various education & training activities in order to increase the Lab visibility in the international research community and attract new skilled researchers and programmers,
• development of the necessary infrastructure to support research activities and the development of intelligent systems and services,
• commercial exploitation of several research prototypes.

POSCON Network Member: Christiana Armeniakou, National Centre for Scientific Research "Demokritos"

What is your / your institution´s interest /objective for being part of POSCON?

SKEL’s interest/ objective for being part of POSCON is due to its previous and ongoing involvement in issues related to safer internet overall. It is our belief that POSCON will meet its objectives and will substantially contribute to the topic of child online safety on European level.

What is your / your institution´s interest regarding positive content in general?

NCSR 'D' through SKEL has a long experience in the area of safer internet.
NCSR'D' coordinated the DG SANCO project MedIEQ (http://www.medieq.org/) on the quality labelling of medical web content and had the technical management of the Safer Internet project Quatro Plus (http://www.quatro-project.org/).
NCSRʼDʼ was also one of the founding members of the W3C working group Protocol for Web Description Resources (POWDER), which became a W3C Recommendation since 2009 (http://www.w3.org/2007/powder/).

The promotion of positive content concept was one of the objectives in Quatro Plus project. Quatro Plus organised pilots with Youth Panels from three countries, Greece, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic, in which students used project tools to label web sites according to their suitability for children. In addition NCSRʼDʼ in the context of Quatro Plus organised a pilot with the Adolescent Health Unit (AHU) in Greece that specialises in the treatment of eating disorders for youth. The AHU pilot aimed to create a white list of good sites with help from AHU experts and using content analysis technology from NCSR ʼDʼ.

SKEL is also a member of the Greek SAFER INTERNET Centre’s Advisory Board which consists of representatives from the government, the industry, child welfare, law enforcement, research and technology, and has as a task to consult the Greek Safer Internet Centre, to propose new activities through its experience in the field, and to act as multiplier body through its own dissemination and information channels.

What are your wishes regarding positive content and services for children?

Our wishes regarding positive content and services for children are the following:

To enhance the quantity and quality of positive content and services for children both at national and European level.

To place safer internet higher on the EC agenda, increasing the financial support for developing further relevant technologies and services.

Το raise awareness about the necessity of positive content and services for children at home, schools, among youngsters.