The mobile phone obsession with children is not hidden from anyone. They are found to spend most of their waking hours using their smartphone and scrolling on social media and messaging apps. The unsupervised and unrestricted mobile phone use of teenagers can cause them to face innumerable dangers such as cyberbullying, sexting, scamming and child predation.
Parents are not only obligated to provide their offspring with smartphones but they are also required to keep a check on their use of these digital devices. In this article, we have discussed a few most effective practices to protect kids from mobile phone menaces and risky digital activities.
Monitor Cell Phones of Kids
The foremost step to prevent kids from dangerous mobile phone activities is cell phone monitoring. You should be aware of what your kids do using their digital devices. You can check out their phones but what if they have already deleted all chats, call logs and locked photo galleries? You can make use of kids spy app to keep a secret eye on cell phone activities of your children. Once you install the app on their device, the app lets you access data saved on your kid’s phone including their chats, contacts, call logs, photos, videos, voice recordings, internet browsing history and more.
Follow Social Media
Social media is the most important thing to watch out for staying updated about your kid’s plans and activities. The teenage boys and girls of this digital age like sharing their moments on social media apps and instant messengers in the form of a status update. These statuses may describe what they have done or what they have planned to do. If you follow social media accounts of your kids, you can keep an eye on their activities performed in real life. Also, social media monitoring helps you to prevent your kids from posting personal and sexually explicit photos and videos on the internet.
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However, the privacy settings of Facebook and similar social media platforms may restrict you from seeing custom posts of your kid. Also, there are probabilities that your kid is using two separate accounts for family and friends and use to post personal stuff on the confidential account. In this situation, the kids spy app can help you close and secretly watch out all social media accounts operated on your kid’s smartphone.
The app allows supervising activities performed on most popular social media apps including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Snapchat. You can secretly read their chats and posts made on these social messengers.
Keep Communicate Line Open
Have frequent discussions with your children about menaces of mobile phones, social media and the internet. Let them know about online bullying and child predation. Also, educate them about ways to combat bullying and child abuse in the real and digital world.
These discussions will help a lot in letting your kids learn using social media and digital technologies securely and responsibly. Discuss with them what stuff they can post on the internet and what can be risky to share with online buddies. Convey the risks attached to posting personal information with online friends. The more you talk about digital technologies, the more your kid would feel encouraged to share personal experiences. They would feel more comfortable telling you if they are engaged in a perilous mobile activity.
Set Digital Rules
Rules can help a lot in promoting discipline. Set rules for the use of mobile phones and other digital devices. Make sure your kids follow these rules inside and outside the house. We have shared here a few examples of the most effective digital rules to protect your kids from dangerous activities.
- Do not allow kids to use cell phones after the specific time of the day i.e., bedtime.
- Do not allow bringing or using phones at the dining table.
- Do not allow going online late at night.
- Do not allow using age-inappropriate and adult-oriented mobile apps and websites.
- Set parental controls on Google and internet browsers used by your kids.
- Disallow creating public profiles on social media for personal use.
- Disallow sharing personal information and sexually explicit photos online.
- Do not allow harassing, threatening or teasing someone online and offline.
The Bottom Line
Kids are likely to get engaged in unsafe mobile phone activities if their parents do not supervise their digital behavior. It is necessary that you keep your eyes and ear open to protect your children from the vulnerabilities of digital devices. Educate your kids about threats of the digital world and ensure their protection with kids spy apps.
