Online quizzes and surveys may appear harmless, entertaining or educational. However, some are designed to collect personal information that can be used to guess passwords, answer security questions, impersonate users or support scams. Questions such as “What was your first school?”, “What is your pet’s name?” or “What is your mother’s name?” may reveal information commonly used to secure online accounts.
Parents and guardians should teach children to be cautious when a quiz or survey:
- Requests names, dates of birth, school details or home location.
- Asks for passwords, PINs, OTPs or account recovery information.
- Promises prizes, airtime, money or gifts for answering questions.
- Requires users to sign in through an unfamiliar link.
- Pressures users to respond quickly or share the quiz with friends.
- Comes from an unknown account or unverified organisation.
- Requests access to contacts, photos, messages or location.
Parents, guardians should guide children to:
- Avoid answering questions that request personal or family information.
- Verify the account, website or organisation before participating.
- Not click suspicious links or download unknown files.
- Use different passwords for different accounts.
- Enable multi-factor authentication on important accounts.
- Review privacy settings and limit who can view personal information.
- Ask a trusted adult before completing unfamiliar quizzes.
- Report and block suspicious accounts, pages or messages.
Remedial steps incase of a suspected data breach:
- Change passwords for affected accounts.
- Update account recovery questions and answers.
- Enable multi-factor authentication.
- Review recent account activity for unfamiliar logins.
- Remove unnecessary personal information from public profiles.
- Report suspicious activity to the relevant platform.
- Inform a parent, guardian, teacher or other trusted adult.
Encourage children to follow one simple rule: “Pause, check and ask before answering online questions or surveys.”
Open conversations about online privacy can help children recognise suspicious requests and protect their personal information.