A/HRC/31/34 efforts should be made to capitalize on their resourcefulness and to strengthen their resilience while exploring the potential of the Internet. 1 III. International legal framework 6. The Convention on the Rights of the Child does not specifically refer to online protection of children’s rights. Indeed, the worldwide web only came online in 1989 (the term “Internet” had been used for the first time only seven years earlier), the same year that the Convention was adopted by the General Assembly. 7. Nonetheless, the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocols thereto, and the Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography in particular, are fully applicable to the digital environment, and provide important guidance for the realization of children’s rights online. In particular, the Convention calls for all measures to be guided by the best interests of the child (art. 3), to respect and support children’s growing autonomy and agency (art. 12) and to protect children from discrimination and violence (arts. 2 and 19). These articles help to capitalize on the potential of the online environment to promote children’s learning and freedom of expression (art. 13), to support children in their access to, receiving and imparting information (arts. 13 and 17), and to protect them from harmful materials and information (art. 19), from unlawful interference with their privacy or correspondence, and from situations where their honour and reputation may be at risk (art. 16). 8. The Convention on the Rights of the Child requires children to be protected against all forms of abuse and neglect (art. 19), including sexual exploitation and sexual abuse (art. 34), and other forms of exploitation prejudicial to the child’s welfare (art. 36). With regard to images of child sexual abuse, the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography prohibits any representation, by whatever means, of a child engaged in real or simulated explicit sexual activities or any representation of the sexual parts of a child for primarily sexual purposes, requiring every State to ensure that producing, distributing, disseminating, importing, exporting, offering, selling or possessing child pornography is fully covered under its criminal or penal law, whether such offences are committed domestically or transnationally or on an individual or organized basis. The Optional Protocol also requires States to criminalize possession of child pornography with the intent to distribute, disseminate and/or sell it. 9. Article 6 of the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography calls upon States parties to afford one another the greatest measure of assistance in connection with investigations or criminal or extradition proceedings, including assistance in obtaining evidence at their disposal necessary for the proceedings. Such assistance is particularly important given the global nature of the Internet and the international dimension that characterizes much online violence, exploitation and abuse. In addition, under article 9 of the Optional Protocol, States parties are required to adopt or strengthen, implement and disseminate laws, administrative measures, and social policies and programmes to prevent the offences to which it refers. Paying special attention to especially vulnerable children is another concern expressed, as well as awareness in the public at large, including children, through information by all appropriate means, education and training, about the preventive measures and harmful effects of the offences referred to 1 Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children, Releasing Children’s Potential and Minimizing Risks: ICTs, the Internet and Violence against Children, New York, 2014, p. 22. 3