Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson is right to help children scrutinise online lies: Andrew Vine

Even so, he’s still uncharacteristically subdued and they remain concerned as well as furious at whoever is behind such cruelty.

That anybody could send such a message to a child is sick to the point of depravity. The sender was unknown, the boy’s mobile number presumably picked out at random or generated by an algorithm, and goodness knows how many other children have been panicked by receiving the same message. For those who have a mother with health problems, the trauma and fear it will cause is appalling to contemplate.

The need to protect the young from the horrors lying in wait online, or insidious malice that can be directed at them even in what should be the safety of their bedrooms, has never been more pressing.

So parents like my friends will wholeheartedly welcome the plan by Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson to ask schools to do more to help children recognise harmful material or untruths masquerading as fact.

She has announced a review of the primary and secondary school curriculums with the intention of boosting critical thinking.

Children will be encouraged to scrutinise reports in trustworthy newspapers such as The Yorkshire Post, and their associated websites. By comparing rigorously-sourced journalism that is accurate and balanced with websites peddling fake news, the young will quickly learn to distinguish between reality and rubbish.

Well done, Ms Phillipson. Just as schools join parents in telling children never to go to strangers, so they need to back up the lessons about online safety mothers and fathers are at such pains to teach at home.

Using newspapers like this one, and the rest of the mainstream media, is an excellent way of doing that. They are familiar, part of everyday life for millions and tell the stories of the places where the children who will read them live.

Unlike something that appears online, they are part of the youngsters’ own communities.

The unwavering commitment to truth and fairness that is the bedrock of all responsible journalism day in, day out, is one of the most powerful weapons we have in countering the putrid nonsense peddled online.

By teaching children to distinguish between the two, we not only safeguard them against being manipulated or sucked into conspiracy theories, we increase their resilience against the sort of evil messaging that so disturbed my friends’ son.

It is beyond time that more was done to increase awareness of the potential dangers of the online world and teach that the people popping up on the mobile are not necessarily friends.

Even as the internet has become the go-to source for information, far too little attention has been paid to getting the message out that much of it cannot be trusted.

And there is a tendency to trust, not just among the young. Once supposed “facts” start to circulate on social media in particular, they gain credence, especially if re-posted by somebody the reader regards as a friend.

Encouraging children to be more sceptical by introducing them to sources of information they can truly trust will help to push this tide of disinformation back.

As if to underline how urgently we need to protect children against the fake and harmful, just days after Ms Phillipson’s announcement, a survey from a family with tragic experience of the depths to which the internet can sink revealed that a flood of material promoting suicide and self-harm to the young remains on platforms hosted by online giants.

Ian Russell, whose 14-year-old daughter, Molly, took her own life after being bombarded with this hideous stuff, called for the Online Safety Act to be strengthened to tackle it.

His charity, the Molly Rose Foundation, audited 12m decisions taken on content allowed to be published on leading platforms. It found that Meta, the owner of Instagram and Facebook, detected only one per cent of suicide and self-harm content. In contrast, 95 per cent was picked up by Pinterest and TikTok.

Which means that enormous amounts are still getting through to vulnerable children. Both Mr Russell and the NSPCC are calling for tougher action against online giants who simply are not doing enough to crack down on what they are carrying.

Every parent in the land would agree. If the people behind such posts, or text messages to a frightened child, cannot be tracked down and punished because they are hidden in the online labyrinth, the least that must happen is that they are somehow silenced.