Sustainability

Understanding the full spectrum of sexuality and gender to reduce cyberbullying

Research on bullying among secondary and vocational students in greater Bangkok, which was conducted in 2019 by Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Economics and dtac, confirms that LGBT youth account for 46.67% of bullying victims.In response, dtac Safe Internet has joined with Plan International Thailand, a non-profit organization fighting for the rights of children, to co-design online curriculum titled “Gender Diversity: Respect to Stop Cyberbullying.” Designed for teachers, it enables them to provide students’ an education on online threats.Krongkaew Panjamahaporn, a specialist on gender-equality at Plan International Thailand, said, “Online and offline bullying happens because people do not understand diversity. Those who appear different are typically singled out and labelled as black sheep. In fact, differences and diversity are the norm. The human race has a vast genetic diversity of physical characteristics. Sexual orientation, too, can be diverse.” “From childhood, humans are taught just two genders – male and female – the only two genders identified on birth certificates. Later in their lives, many babies will grow up and find out that their gender identity does not match the sex they were assigned to at birth. Such cases are just natural,” she added. How to Explain Gender and Sexuality To promote…

Fighting the sextortion of children

Police Colonel Morakot Sangsrakoo is with a very special agency within the Royal Thai Police. Since its creation in 2016, the Thailand Internet Crimes Against Children (TICAC) has been working to catch online predators and protect their victims, closing 212 cases and arresting 245 offenders. Unfortunately, there are more cases every year and a single offender can create hundreds of victims.“There’s a growing desire among young people to achieve online fame, which their parents also support and encourage by creating online profiles for their children, even when their age violates the platform’s rules. This has led to growing online risk exposure,” said Pol Col Morakot.We recently met with him after he gave a lecture on online privacy and sexual abuse at the dtac Young Safe Internet Cyber camp. The project is part of the dtac Safe Internet initiative to develop digital literacy and resilience skills for children and their family members, allowing them to surf the internet safely.He focused particularly on sextortion, a form of blackmail where a perpetrator threatens to reveal intimate images of the victim online unless the victims give in to their demands for money, further intimate images or even a real-life encounter. How sextortion happens “Predators…

This family-owned textile factory is pushing for a more sustainable future with dtac

dtac "Think Hai d" t-shirts are now made of plastic bottles and old clothes, saving thousands of liters per shirt. While dtac isn’t a clothing brand, the company does produce a line of branded items sold at the dtac House headquarters. As dtac curbs its environmental impact across its entire supply chain, the mobile operator turned its attention to the t-shirts it produces. The manufacturing of a single t-shirt can require enough water to quench a human’s thirst for three years. Moreover, the textile and fashion industry account for 10 per cent of the world’s total carbon-dioxide emissions today. It is the second biggest polluter, behind the energy industry. Thus began dtac’s search for a way to curb its fashion line’s carbon footprint, which led to contracting Saeng Charoen Grand Company Limited (SC GRAND), Thailand’s first textile recycling factory. Jirarot “Wat” Pojanavaraphan, managing director and third-generation owner of SC GRAND , told dtac blog, “For dtac’s t-shirt production, we use two sources of recycled materials: old clothes and plastic bottles. The result is a recycled polyester fiber blend. With four old t-shirts and four plastic bottles, we can make one brand-new t-shirt!” The process begins with separating textile waste by…

dtac says stringent waste sorting needed to slow Thailand’s mounting trash problems

There is growing awareness in Thailand for the environmental impact of waste on our soil, air and water. The year kicked off with ban on single-use plastic bags, which were previously handed out so freely that even buying a bottle of water in a convenience store would come with an obligatory accompaniment of one straw and one small bag. But then urban waste almost doubled between January and March from a year ago mainly due to increased food deliveries propelled by social distancing. Today, Thailand’s trash problems remain as pressing as ever. Considering its own environmental impact, dtac has committed to zero landfill by 2022. Achieving this target will involve stringent sorting of waste. Last year, dtac generated 281 tons of general waste. Bringing that figure to zero means carefully separating all trash into six categories that can be processed through recycling, incineration, or even used as fish food. It is a difficult task that involves educating thousands of employees on the complex distinctions between trash types. dtac blog sat down with Kultawat Sindhuseka, dtac’s head of facility and his team members – Vipada Manutad and Trintapat Akarawanidvhawat, to talk about their role in handling the waste at dtac facilities…

We all have a part to play in solving Thailand’s urgent waste problem

This is a guest post by Rachaya Kulnapongse, Head of Sustainability, dtac. When it comes to waste, it is the plastics at sea that generate the largest headlines in Thailand. In 2018, the story of a whale that washed ashore in Songkhla gripped the nation. After it died an agonizing death, the postmortem revealed the poor beast had starved to death, its stomach filled with 80 plastic bags. A year later, a 10km long island of trash floating in the Gulf of Thailand again provided an all too vivid reminder of waste’s impact on the oceans. By contrast, the waste accumulating in Thailand’s landfills is often ignored, despite being a major source of air, soil and water pollution. According to the Pollution Control Department, solid and hazardous waste in Thailand increased by 15 percent over the past decade. Bangkok alone produces 4.84 million tons a year, accounting for 17 percent of landfills in the country. Around 30 percent of solid waste is managed and disposed of sustainably, while the rest is added to landfills which grow larger every day. The growth of waste is global, driven by rapid urbanization, growing global populations and overconsumption in high-income countries. It leads to…

Researcher highlights role of education in cyberbullying

“They’re just playing. Don’t take it seriously.” If you grew up in a Thai school, chances are you’ve at one point encountered this line or something like it — from pupils and teachers alike. Sadly, an ignorance towards the toxic nature of bullying pervades Thailand’s education system. Modern technology could hold so many keys to help spread a wider understanding of bullying and its consequences, but instead we see new digital spaces making bullying more widespread, and with less accountability. Online social platforms have widened the prevalence of bullying in Thailand to the point that it now sits in the top five countries with the highest number of reported cyberbullying cases globally, according to the Department of Mental Health. Mr. Thanee Chaiwat, director of the Chulalongkorn Experimental Economics Center, has dedicated years of research to the problem. Last year, dtac commissioned Mr. Thanee to conduct a research study on cyberbullying behavior among secondary school students in greater Bangkok in a bid to understand the root cause of the problem. The move came as part of dtac’s ongoing initiative to advocate against and raise public awareness towards the risk cyberbullying poses to the nation. Abuses of power Cyberbullying fits within a…

How to manage stress and maintain positive energy during COVID-19?

During the unprecedented time of COVID-19, people are more concerned about their physical health to prevent infections – using face masks, cleaning hands often with soap or hand sanitizer. Besides, people are unconsciously suffering mental health problems with fear, stress and anxiety. According to data from the department of mental health, it showed that around 73.91% of Thais have moderate mental health problems, followed by mild illness at 20.37% and severe level at 5.72%. The survey was made weekly between Mar 24 and May 24 with 1,500 respondents. Additionally, Thailand are facing the growing trend of suicide rates, increasing from 6.03 from 2018 to 6.64 in late last year. (The figure is per 100,000 people) Those numbers flag an urgency of how people to cope with mental health crisis during this tough time. In an interview, Pichai Ittasakul, the secretary general at The Psychiatric Association of Thailand (PAT), discusses about the current situation of mental health, symptoms development of mental illness and how to develop and maintain positive energy during COVID-19 time. How is the current situation of Thais’ mental health? The increasing numbers of news reports about suicidal incidents during this unprecedented time can identify the rise of mental…

dtac launches online learning platform to build children’s digital resilience

June 2, 2020 - dtac is boosting children’s immunity to online threats through a new e-learning platform titled "Class for Super Kids,” which offers tutorials on technologies such as artificial intelligence or data visualization, in addition to building up their understanding of online threats. The Class for Super Kids – which launched today - is focused on creating responsible netizens while ensuring they can safely benefit from new technologies. After registering at learn.safeinternet.camp, children can access eight classes which last roughly one hour each. They can study at their own pace. The project is part of dtac’s Safe Internet mission, now in its fifth year. For 2020, the Safe Internet project is focusing on respecting sexual diversity, in response to a rise in online bullying of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) youth, 80 percent of whom have reported that they have been victims of bullying. On-Uma Vattanasuk Rerkpattanapipat, dtac’s Head of Communication & Sustainability, said, “The Class for Super Kids project is designed to give knowledge and skills that aren’t currently taught in school. These skills are essential for children and teens, given that they spend nine hours or more on the online world on average.” With these…

dtac CEO: “Supporting Thailand in the New Normal”

Dear customers, The threat of COVID-19 infections will end one day, although it will be many months. Even so, we are in a new normal that is here to stay no matter what: Digital channels will grow even more quickly than we had anticipated. Certain forms of social distancing measures will remain indefinitely. Recovering from the COVID-19’s economic impact will take a long time. Change is always scary but dtac responded to the COVID-19 situation quickly and effectively. And we will continue to do so. DIGITAL CHANNELS In March, dtac saw an explosion in the use of productivity apps like Zoom and Office 365. Usage of the dtac app also grew by 30 percent since the emergency decree, while daily user on dtac.co.th increased by 40% for the same period (March 25-April 23). We supported these changes with numerous measures for our customers: New packages with free data on productivity apps that are essential to Thailand’s economy. Incentives for new users of the dtac app, such as free data. Contingency measures to both maintain and continue developing our network. On the last point, dtac can continue to operate its Network Operation Center even if our headquarters were shut down. (In…

How kids fix their online problems by themselves—and why it can be a problem

Youth have the highest internet penetration rates of 89.8% in Thailand thanks to a firm foundation of connectivity across the nation. When it comes to the use of technology, however, they are classified as a vulnerable group due to the lack of digital literacy, leading to a number of online risks. UNICEF, the United Nations agency responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide, identifies five groups of online risks; content risk, contact risk, commercial risk, conduct risk and time-consuming risk. “When it comes to the use of technology, digital literacy plays an integral role in promoting creative use and creating digital resilience. dtac as a part of digital ecosystem, we realize our role in promoting digital literacy in partnership with the government agencies and NGOs through Young Safe Internet Leader Camp, which is in its second edition already,” said On-uma Rerkpattanapipat, Head of Corporate Communications and Sustainability at dtac. “Design thinking” is adopted as a core structure of learning curve development, unlocking youth participants’ potential to truly understand the root cause of those problems in many prospects. Additionally, dtac also provided initial funding for project scaleup. Let’s have a look at those three of the ten projects…

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