Facebook launches Digital Literacy Library in six languages

NEW DELHI: As part of its efforts to train 3,00,000 people in India on digital literacy by end of 2018, Facebook has announced the launch of the Digital Literacy Library, a collection of lessons in six local languages -- Hindi, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and Malayalam.

This was announced Facebook's South Asia Safety Summit where the Ministry of Women and Child Development together with Facebook convened a group of leaders in safety and technology and was joined by over 70 organizations from five countries, including India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.

“Everyone deserves to feel safe on Facebook, and we feel it is important that we help people safely navigate the Internet. The launch of the Digital Literacy Library, the child safety hackathon and several offline training programs we run in partnership with local experts, reaffirm our seriousness in combating online abuse. We expect to train 3,00,000 people by end of 2018, and we will multiply these efforts in times to come.” said Antigone Davis, Global head for Safety, Facebook.


The ready-to-use lessons in the Library are drawn from the Youth and Media team at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. With more than 200 million young people online in India, this library will be a resource for educators looking to address digital literacy and help young people build the skills needed for safely enjoying digital technology.

“These trainings are targeted primarily towards women and youth and are being done in collaboration with organizations such as Cyber Peace Foundation, Learning Links Foundation, Internet and Mobile Association of India, Gaon Connection, and Centre for Social Research, to name a few,” Davis added.