Framing media literacy and digital safety in Kazakhstan's television news

In increasingly complex digital information environments, media literacy is closely connected with digital safety, as citizens must not only evaluate information but also recognize digital threats, verify sources, and make protective decisions. This study examines how Kazakhstan television news communicates digital risks and the extent to which such reporting provides audiences with actionable information. A comparative quantitative content analysis was conducted of 342 purposively sampled news items published by nine Kazakhstan television outlets between January 2025 and August 2026. Drawing on framing theory, research on mobilizing information and solutions journalism, and the digital-resilience literature, items were coded for digital-risk theme, dominant journalistic frame, practical advice, and a three-level actionability measure. Internet fraud and scams was the most frequent theme (40.1%). Practical advice was present in 56.1% of items, but only 17.0% reached the highest level of actionability by providing specific verification procedures, official resources, or concrete protective actions. Journalistic frame was strongly associated with practical advice (Cramér's V = .665) and actionability (V = .565), digital-risk theme showed moderate associations, and outlet identity was not significantly associated with either outcome in bivariate tests. Robustness analyses showed that the frame association was concentrated in prevention- and warning-oriented reporting: 50 of the 58 items with operational guidance were framed as education or prevention, whereas only one of the 196 incident, regulatory, law-enforcement, or other items reached this level. Operational guidance was thus concentrated in prevention-oriented reporting rather than being routinely incorporated into incident-, regulation-, or enforcement-oriented stories. Building on constructive and solutions journalism, the study proposes resilience-supportive journalism as a content-level framework describing reporting that complements risk visibility with graded information supporting recognition, verification, and protective action. Audience effects were not measured. Limitations include the purposive thematic sample, the partial 2026 observation period, and the conceptual proximity between some frame categories and the guidance measures.