EDUCATION

A total of 741 smartphone users under 18 became victims of sex crimes in Japan in 2013 as a result of the use of social networking sites, up 4.6-fold from the previous year, the National Police Agency said Tuesday. (Jiji Press)

A British court has ordered the return of a child to Japan under the Hague convention on child abduction, in the first case applied to a Japanese child since Japan ratified the treaty to help settle international child custody disputes, people involved in the case said Tuesday. (Kyodo)

With the number of privately run nursery schools increasing in Japan, many such facilities are working to come up with novel services in order to survive, including original educational materials and English conversation classes. (The Japan News)

A name-list trader that bought Benesse Corp. customer information from a systems engineer arrested last week has resold data on some 470,000 Benesse customers for 1.2 million yen to an education-related company in the Kyushu southwestern Japan region, investigative sources said Friday. (Jiji Press)

Former J-pop star, erotic novelist and television sex guru Aya Sugimoto is already well-known in the Japanese animal welfare community for her strong anti-fur stance, but this year she has taken aim at the abominable state of Japan’s pet industry by founding her own animal welfare organization, Eva. (rocketnews24.com)

Early commuters exiting JR Tokyo Station on July 25 noticed a mass of people doing the downward-facing dog and other body-stretching positions under the heat of the early morning sun. (Asahi)

The body of a second-year high school girl was discovered in the sea off Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, on July 8, in what police believe may have been a suicide caused by bullying. (Japan Today)

Amid a series of research misconduct cases involving universities and research institutions in the nation, such as the recent controversy over articles on stimulus-triggered acquisition of pluripotency (STAP) cells, there is increasing criticism over insufficient investigations into suspected research misconduct. (The Japan News)

On 16 July Sapporo Attorney Ayako Ito made a visit to Sapporo Kotoni Technical High School to assist the social studies teacher Shiego Kawahara in an important lesson regarding the right of collective self-defense. It’s a thorny issue that can be difficult enough to explain to adults let alone teenagers. (rocketnews24.com)

Police and health officials in Ueda, Nagano Prefecture, said Monday that around 300 students suffered food poisoning at a soccer and rugby tournament. Of those, 120 were taken to hospital but none suffered any lasting effects, police said. (Japan Today)