This xmas, one of my littles (not that little) will be getting their first phone. He’s at the age where I’m comfortable leaving him by himself for short periods of time both at home and at school events. I’d prefer he have a phone in case of emergency, so I’m getting him one, and android OS.
He’s technologically a novice so I have some concerns about what he will do with the phone. The internet will be at his fingertips and I think given the plethora of spam/scams/porn that I’d want to be avoided at this age, I’m going to be putting some kind of monitoring software on it. I will tell him that it’s there so it being secret isn’t necessary.
I’m with you, although I know I’m in the minority. I was always honest with my kids as far as my expectations. They may have stretched things beyond where I’d be happy (that’s an assumption with kids), but I would never “spy”. And I’m basically a cynic in other areas.
I don’t think I’d give a kid a smart phone as their first phone. If you just want them to be able to contact you, get them a flip phone that they can make calls and send texts with.
We’ve had some of the grandkids on our plan (Verizon) at times over the years, and one thing I learned the hard way is that kids will chew up your plan in no time flat. When we first put two of them on our plan, it was not yet unlimited minutes and text, and they literally burned through our plan in two days. When one got his first smart phone, he used up our shared data plan in less than a week. I wound up having to get the Verizon Family app so I could throttle his data usage.
I doubt that any product sold for installation on the phone itself is going to be very effective. It’s just too difficult to regulate and monitor a constantly updating OS and all the various apps that might be used on it. Instead, I would consider options that restrict access to the internet at the router level (which can target just the one device, if you wish). You can use pre-made age-appropriate white lists, or you can make your own. You can even buy devices these days that make it very easy. I believe Android devices can be restricted from joining other networks.
That doesn’t give you the ability to, say, give your kid a FB account or Snapchat and monitor his direct messages, but anyone promising the ability to do that is lying.
I’ll try to avoid veering into parenting advice, which you did not solicit, but I would just add that I would not rely entirely on anyone else’s white list. For example, Disney probably blocks websites that help kids explore questions related to their sexuality and mental health. Giving your kids unmonitored access to stuff like that, which I would encourage you to do, means tweaking the white lists.
I’m not that concerned about data - we have a large family plan and use less than 10% of it. The smart phone is a compromise - keeps me able to be contacted and let’s the kid have some autonomy and ability to access some entertainment similar to kids his age.
I’m not really spying per se since I will tell him I’m monitoring all the activity. Given I monitor all activity generally as a parent the phone activity is no different. It’s primarily for safety and security rather than content. Having GPS data is my #1 requirement. I know some folks are not in favor and i respect other parents choices.
Most of what I’ve seen require s payment, which I’m not opposed to but would prefer a buy model vs a subscription. They will probably learn to bypass or circumvent it eventually if they wish, but right now I don’t think they’d even want to if they could.
As for router level security, ive explored it a bit but mine doesn’t play nice with other setups I have in the house. I could probably figure it out but it is both super frustrating and not that useful because I’m not really concerned about stuff inside the house. There are already multiple tablet/computer devices around that have unrestricted access.
Things I really want to know - where the device is, if it’s being used during school hours, and third is internet activity. We’ve had talk about sex and biology, etc. I’d prefer he ask me questions if he has any but I know it’s easy to quickly go down the rabbit hole online and there’s a lot of stuff that I think can be confusing and inappropriate at his age.
A friend of mine uses “where’s my iPhone” to monitor his 16 year old son. One day we were out at a bar, and Mike got out his phone and showed me that his son was leaving the house with his gf (who was driving). They were supposed to be going to see a movie.
A short time later Mike checked again, and saw that the phone was now heading home. He was sure they were going to make use of the empty house for SEX stuff.
So, we left the bar. I drove Mike home. He was livid. When we arrived at his house, he burst through the door. The gf was sitting on the couch, but his son was not there. He asked the gf “where is Jack?”
“He had to poop so we came back home.” Boy, that was embarrassing.
Open accountability isn’t spying and I wouldn’t just “trust” a kid or young teen in an environment full of people skilled in tricking or manipulating kids and teens. When I gave my kid his first phone, it came with the understanding that I had open access to it and things like carefully wiped histories, etc weren’t going to fly. Any passwords he used had to be shared with us and having stuff locked from us was grounds to take the phone away.
Truth be told, I barely called him out or checked it and didn’t make much mention of the mainstream nudie searches I’d find. However, once he was sending some inappropriate photos out which resulted in a talk about the numerous reasons why that was a bad idea. And, yes, we’d had a talk about it prior but this stuff always strikes home more when it’s about a real event and not a theoretical to a nodding kid who just wants to agree and get his phone.
I use Screentime for my daughter’s phone. It doesn’t monitor the phone, exactly. It’s useful for blocking apps and setting times she can/can’t use the phone.
She has the app on her phone (which she so far, in three years, has not figured out how to remove), and I and her mother have the “control” apps on our phones. There is also access to her phone via Screentime’s web site.
Whenever she installs a new app, it’s automatically blocked from use until I “approve” it (remove it from the block list). But any particular app is all or nothing. She has access to Chrome, for example, but I have no control over what websites she’s visiting. I could look up her browsing history, if I choose to, but I never do.
Left to her own devices (heh), my daughter would stay up all night every night fooling around on her phone. Screentime has a “school time”, a “bedtime”, and a “lights out” category for restricting apps and times. We can pick and choose what apps “turn off” at bedtime; then at lights out, everything except emergency stuff shuts down. So, for example, at bedtime she can no longer access Chrome and Youtube and the like, but she can still listen to music.
Another cool feature is I can grant or take away access on a whim. Say she’s been told to do her chores ten times, but keeps delaying because she’s messing with her phone… I can whip out my phone and cut her off from her apps.
It’s a nifty program, I’ve been quite happy with it. I don’t remember off-hand, but I think we pay $20 or $25 every six months. I should also mention that our phones are Android; I think the features on the iPhone version are nowhere near as robust.
We use Parental control and digital wellbeing software | Qustodio for our kid’s phones. Works great. The parental blocking feature keeps the adult sites off the phone. You can get alerts if you want to if they try to access an adult site. The GPS location is always accurate as well.
5 device package for a year covered all laptops and phones.
If your primary concern is GPS, I believe that most providers have some form of where’s-my-phone service available at little or no cost. You should probably check with them first.
