When it comes to kids, tracking – like almost all technology – can be a double-edged sword. Knowing where your children are at all times can be reassuring, but it can also be a major breach of their privacy and a hindrance to their ability to learn self-reliance.

Setting rules based on where your kids and go and when sounds fine, but becoming an omnipotent helicopter parent isn’t necessarily the healthiest way to enforce them.

Apple’s AirTag can become a child tracking device for kids too young to have phones.

It’s worth remembering that a lot of these tracking solutions market themselves as providing “peace of mind”, which in the worlds of both technology and consumer products is often another way of saying the company’s identified a common anxiety to exploit for profit.

That said, if you do feel there’s a genuine need for them, there are ways to use the available tools thoughtfully and transparently.

If you and your kids have Apple devices, and you’ve already set up Family Sharing, there’s a built-in way to be able to see their location. On their device they’ll need to go to Settings > Family > Location Sharing to turn it on, and they can choose which family members to share with.

People can generally revoke or change these sharing permissions at any time, but if you’re their guardian you can use your device to block them from making changes, meaning you’ll always be able to see where they are.

While someone is sharing their location with you, you can open the Find My app to see where they are on a map. You can also set up recurring notifications that will be sent when their devices arrive or leave certain places, so for example you could get a notification when they leave school, and another when they arrive home.

QOSHE - Honey I tracked the kids: How to supervise with technology - Tim Biggs
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Honey I tracked the kids: How to supervise with technology

23 0
29.12.2023

When it comes to kids, tracking – like almost all technology – can be a double-edged sword. Knowing where your children are at all times can be reassuring, but it can also be a major breach of their privacy and a hindrance to their ability to learn self-reliance.

Setting rules based on where your kids and go and when sounds fine, but becoming an omnipotent helicopter parent isn’t necessarily the healthiest way to enforce........

© The Sydney Morning Herald


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