At Harvard’s Berkman Center, John Palfrey, Urs Gasser, and danah boyd have been co-directing Youth and Media Policy Working Group Initiative to investigate the role that policy can play in addressing core issues involving youth and media. John has been leading up the Privacy, Publicity, and Reputation track; Urs has been managing Youth Created Content and Information Quality track; and danah has been coordinating the Risky Behaviors and Online Safety track. As a part of this working group it is a pleasure to be involved in a series of essays that will be published this summer, the first four are now online:

Evaluating Online Safety Programs by Tobit Emmens and Andy Phippen

The Future of Internet Safety Education: Critical Lessons from Four Decades of Youth Drug Abuse Prevention by Lisa M. Jones

Online Safety: Why Research is Important by David Finkelhor, Janis Wolak, and Kimberly J. Mitchell

These four essays provide crucial background information for understanding the challenges of implementing education and public health interventions in the area of online safety.