Children are spending half as much time in class as they do looking at computer or TV screens, according to new research. 

The report Consumer Kids, written by Ed Mayo, head of Consumer Focus said that children are a captive audience for sophisticated and energetic marketing techniques because they spend so much of their day online or in front of the television. British kids spend five hours and 18 minutes watching television, playing computer games or online each day.

This 2,000 hours a year compares with 900 hours in class and 1,270 hours with their parents. It says that while parents are paranoid about sex pests getting hold of their precious snowflakes they have no concept of how business grooms their children for profit. Kids are recruited through membership schemes or special offers to peddle products to their mates. 

Personal information is routinely sought, often as a condition of getting access to a site, the report said More than a third of children have their own laptop or PC and two thirds have a games console.