The internet security sector has many evolving challenges. As an example, protecting children and teenagers that are online is a growing concern for parents, educators, and public administrators.
Meanwhile, the number of digital platforms that young people can use to access the Internet is constantly increasing: smartphones, tablets, and gaming consoles are popular connected platforms adding to the existing PC and laptop vectors.
Cyber bullying and grooming, violent and inappropriate content, exposure of personal data, and privacy violations are all too common threats.
According to the latest market study by ABI Research, low parental knowledge and lack of adequate cyber education for children is prompting a surge in demand for filtering, blocking, and control technologies.
The child online protection and parental control market is a lucrative one. The drivers for growth are inherently affected by many different cultural, educational, moral, and personal factors.
Consequently, the demand for appropriate solutions is not only large, but also varied; vertically (by international organizations, national bodies, educational institutions, and individual parents) and horizontally (by Internet service providers, broadcasters, and telecommunications operators).
"While advanced digital education for children remains deficient, the demand for control and blocking solutions remains high, and is creating a highly fragmented, ad-hoc yet competitive market for parental control vendors," said Michela Menting, senior analyst at ABI Research.
Over time however, ABI believes that as the digital knowledge gap closes, educational solutions will feature much more prominently in the market for child online protection.
They calculate that the global parental control software market to be worth $1.044 billion in 2013.
The market will be driven primarily by parental spending; to a lesser extent, educational institutions, such as schools and public libraries, and information and communication service providers will weigh in as well.
The software related products and services within this sector include filtering, blocking, monitoring, data collection, surveillance, and notification technologies.
