Children and young people today grow up naturally in a digital world. With smartphones, tablets, and game consoles, they establish their own access points at increasingly younger ages and largely embrace the diverse possibilities of the internet, online services, apps, and digital games without inhibition. This offers them not only numerous opportunities for information, orientation, and knowledge acquisition, for communicative exchange and social networking, for creativity and self-expression, for social participation, and even for political engagement, but also for confronting the dangers of the digital world at an increasingly early age. This refers to early exposure to content-related risks and new risks related to consumption, communication, and behavior that impact personality development. This foundational work provides a well-founded and clear introduction to the significant changes for educational professionals, educators, students of educational and communication science programs, and all interested parties. It outlines facets of a new type of socialization in an increasingly mediatized society, traces the altered use of media in a differentiated manner, including the opportunities and risks for the development of young people, and, starting from the digital rights of children and young people to participation, protection, and support, describes the challenges for legal regulation, educational practice, and everyday educational life. New product