Most children now spend part of their day inside online games, and those spaces carry the same risks as the rest of the internet: scams, phishing, stolen accounts, contact from strangers, and spending that mounts up before anyone notices. Parents and teachers do not need to master any particular game to lower those risks. What helps is a few account settings in place, plain names for the common threats, and a child who feels able to report when something feels wrong.
How common are these risks?
Gaming is now a default rather than a niche. Ofcom reports that 97% of 8 to 17-year-olds in the UK play online games, based on a 2025 survey of 2,205 children and their parents. Where children gather, threats follow. A global study by BCG and the Global Cybersecurity Forum found that 72% of children surveyed had experienced at least one online threat, drawing on 41,000 parents and children across 24 countries in 2022. These problems are common, which is the argument for a routine response rather than a one-off scare.
What are the real threats inside a game?
Four threats show up again and again, and each has a plain shape a child can learn to spot.
- Scams and phishing. Offers of free skins, currency or giveaways lead to fake login pages built to harvest passwords, and the same trick arrives as a private message from a stranger posing as a helpful teammate.
- Account theft. A stolen login costs a child their progress, their purchases and, at times, access to a linked payment method. Most account thefts start with a password handed over, not a system broken into.
- Unsafe contact. Voice and text chat put children next to strangers, and harassment inside games is routine: ADL reported that 75% of teens and pre-teens experienced harassment in online multiplayer games in 2023, in a US survey of around 2,000 players.
- Spending. In-game purchases move fast and repeat often. Ofcom found that around one in five gamers who bought something with someone else’s money did so without permission.
What can parents do in an afternoon?
None of the fixes require deep technical skill. A short setup session covers most of the ground.
- Turn on two-factor authentication for the game account, the store account and the email behind them. This single step blocks most account theft.
- Set up the platform’s family or parental controls, and add a spending limit or a purchase password to the account.
- Use a payment method that caps the damage, such as a prepaid card or a gift-card balance, instead of a directly linked credit card.
- Agree one simple rule with your child: never share a login, a code or a password, and never click a link that promises free items.
- Make yourself the safe person to tell. A child who fears losing the game will hide a problem until it grows. Ask what they play and who with, without turning it into an interrogation.
What can schools and teachers do?
Schools reach the same children these offers and messages reach, which makes the classroom a useful place to build the habit of caution.
- Teach the tells of a phishing attempt with real examples: the fake giveaway, the lookalike login page, the urgent private message from a stranger.
- Fold two-factor authentication and password basics into digital-skills lessons as a habit worth repeating, not a one-off assembly.
- Set a clear, low-friction way for pupils to report contact or content that worried them, and make sure they know that using it carries no punishment.
- Point parents to the same guidance, so home and school say the same thing.
How do you keep the tone calm?
Fear teaches children to hide problems. Steadiness teaches them to report. The figures above describe common experiences, not rare disasters, so treat them the way you treat road safety: a few habits, repeated until they stick. A child who knows the four threats, uses two-factor authentication, and trusts an adult to help is better protected than one kept away from games altogether. That combination, not any single tool, is what keeps play safe.
