GIGA School Device Usage Case Study of Chiba Prefecture's Ichihara City Board of Education
— Realize teachers' desire to keep their students from being the victims or perpetrator of crimes using filtering —

Information security solutions provider Digital Arts Inc. (headquarters: Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan; CEO: Toshio Dogu; hereinafter referred to as "Digital Arts"; Securities Code 2326) is pleased to announce on December 22 it released an introduction case study of the Ichihara City Board of Education in Chiba Prefecture, which used the web security cloud service i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition as a security measure for the one device per student GIGA School Program.

Introducing a Case Study of a Board of Education That Introduced Filtering to Ensure Proper Use of Devices

The GIGA School Program, which aims to provide devices and high-speed internet to every student nationwide, coupled with the increased need for online learning brought on by the pandemic, has led many local governments to fully introduce devices by the end of fiscal 2020. Each municipality continues to promote the use of technology in schools and investigate the optimal way to operate the program, including how to use devices for learning and usage rules for students.

In the midst of all this, it was found that a tragic incident occurred in September, 2021 where an elementary school girl in Tokyo committed suicide after being bullied in chat rooms on devices distributed through the GIGA School Program. Children are still in the developmental stages of relationships and communication, and their internet literacy, too, is in its infancy. At this stage, both the issue of whether to allow students to use devices connected to the internet without restriction and the use of GIGA School devices have been highlighted. To prevent such incidents from happening again, is there any way to keep an eye on children's safety and allow them to use their devices safely?

Since April 2020, Digital Arts has been providing the web security cloud service i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition so that students can use GIGA School devices safely and teachers and parents can have peace of mind in letting their children use the devices. On December 22, we released a case study of the Ichihara City Board of Education in Chiba Prefecture, which introduced i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition and has been actively promoting the use of technology in its schools.

It is important to be able to stop students with a system, not just words and rules.

Ichihara City has been quick in its efforts to improve the IT environment at its and has been actively promoting the use of technology. With the GIGA School Program that began in 2020, Ichihara City has installed 20,500 Windows tablets, as well as smart boards and equipment necessary for holding online classes. In addition, instead of centralized wide area networks, the board developed a network environment that allows schools to directly connect to the internet, and even pre-pandemic introduced i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition, expecting to offer off-site learning.

In order to realize the "individualization of learning" and "development of 21st century skills" set forth by the GIGA School concept, a clear vision is essential, and Ichihara City has come up with its own step-by-step goals, "ICHR Style. Isao Ikuta, Chief Instructor at the Ichihara City Education Center, said, "We have come up with four stages so that we can promote the use of the system step by step."

Ikuta consider filtering "essential" for off-site learning. He said, "To protect children from the dangers on the internet, it is difficult to stop them with just warnings and rules. We think it's important to have a system in pace that can stop them, so we introduced filters."

Filter controls are essential because the world is a tough place to learn the dangers all by yourself.

In teaching children, it is important to teach them what is dangerous, but the world is getting tougher for them to learn what is dangerous. As no teachers teacher wants to see their children fall victim to or perpetrate crime, it is important to be able to stop children from getting into danger. "i-FILTER@Cloud" blocks such actions, so we can rest assured," said Ikuta.

Specifically, i-FILTER@Cloud's device quarantine function has proved useful for schools. This function quarantines client devices that have accessed URLs such as "threatening sites" so that they cannot be used on the internet via i-FILTER, and notifies the administrator by email. Another is that restrictions can be placed on social media apps offered in the tablets' app store, preventing students from by bypassing browser-based filters to access social media. "Many of the recent app store apps have a features for sharing to social media, which makes us nervous about using them in class. That's why we used i-FILTER@Cloud to block social media in apps as well," said Ikuta.

Off-site learning has been accelerated by the safe and secure environment of i-FILTER@Cloud and its extensive services.

From the beginning of the GIGA School Program, the city has been considering off-site learning and has developed mobile Wi-Fi routers for homes without an internet connection. In addition, the digital learning platforms used for off-site learning are selected to be able to be worked on offline so that teachers can easily assign homework. As a result, even in the first year of the GIGA School Program, most of the 62 schools in the city implemented off-site learning, and there have been months where the number of accesses to the digital learning platforms was the highest in Japan.

At one junior high school in the city, materials for the student assembly were created as PDF files and distributed to all students via Microsoft Teams. There was also an effort to have students vote using Microsoft Forms. Ikuta said, "It's important to teach students what not to do, but I felt that if they use it in a useful way, their literacy will also improve. i-FILTER@Cloud plays a role in stopping various dangers in their tracks so that children can use their devices to the fullest."

Ichihara City plans to continue to engage in many advanced learning activities using technology in the future. For example, on school trips, students bring their own tablets and mobile Wi-Fi routers, and try their hand at group work while keeping in touch with their teachers through Teams. As well, Ikuta said that the city will continue to focus on improving the technology utilization skills of teachers. "I would like to expand the use of YouTube, which is increasingly being used by teachers. Using the web service controls offered by i-FILTER@Cloud, it's possible to allow videos on a case-by-case basis. I'd like to make better use of such features to hoepfully enable teachers to use technology more."

- The full case study of the Ichihara City Board of Education in Chiba Prefecture can be found here

Digital Arts "i-FILTER@Cloud" GIGA School Edition Special Lineup

In addition to "post controls" and "web service controls," which prohibit posts related to cyberbullying, our system is also equipped with a "Child Protection System."

Digital Arts' web security cloud service i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition is a filtering service for schools that has been improved to enable the use of the GIGA School Concept's one device per student initiative and allow safe and smooth learning in educational settings. Based on i-FILTER's filter database, which has the No.1 share in the domestic market^*, detailed filtering rules can be made to meet the learning environment's needs.

In addition, all three operating systems recommended by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) in its GIGA School Concept can use the "post controls" function, which controls the posting of messages by students on hidden message boards and social media websites, and the uploading of photos taken with the device's built-in camera. This will prevent children and students from using the devices for private use, using them for purposes unrelated to learning, and writing messages that could lead to bullying. In addition, "Web Service Controls" controls functions such as login, writing, uploading, and downloading for each web service, and the "Child Protection System" blocks students' access to suicide-related websites from their own devices using i-FILTER@Cloud and alerts designated teachers and staff or the Board of Education by e-mail. These functions help support educational settings to keep an eye on children's safety and find distressed students as soon as possible.

i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition

i-FILTER@Cloud GIGA School Edition

* Fuji Chimera Research Institute, Inc. "2021 Network Security Business Survey General Guide" Web Filtering Tool Market Share (FY2020) (Published September 2021)