Where Do I Start? An Online Safety Guide For Anxious Parents
How to begin with child safety online - taking the first steps
“My teenage son just plays on his Playstation in his room a lot, my two youngest are downstairs, but they just sit on their tablets half the time, I’m just so busy its helpful to have the distraction. I read something in the news about the awful stuff kids watch online these days, and I feel so bad but I don’t know what to do now, they would hate me if I took the screens away”
If this scenario sounds even halfway familiar, don’t worry, you’re not alone. Parenting was a lot easier when children just watched TV or DVDs, and now you have to worry about DMs, YouTube content, strangers messaging your children, online bullying, one child spending your money unlocking some new game gimmick, the other doesn’t know the difference between an animation, an AI cat and a real video.
Its overwhelming at this point, and even parents who feel more tech-savvy or who grew up with the internet feel concerned: Roblox, deepfakes, AI-chat bots, influencers, VR reaction channels.
This guide will lay out the first basic steps towards establishing some protection for your family, and how to make the process normal and collaborative, rather than creating conflict.
Step 1) Open up communication
There’s no escaping the digital world, its part of yours and your child’s life. So talk about it as a family - start with gentle questions about what your children do online, what they enjoy, what games are their favourite? What do their friends do?
The online world is hugely entertaining, share some funny videos or pictures. Then start checking in with them if anything unpleasant happens when they go online - do they see any pictures that make them feel unhappy? Do other people talk to them during games? Do their friends talk about bad things they’ve seen?
Make the internet normal - just like cars are normal, everyone needs to know the rules to keep safe
Talk to your kids about what they do online
Make a habit of checking-in with them, has anything happened?
Establish from the outset that they can always come to you with anything, and you won’t be angry with them
Step 2) Check your devices
How many devices do you have at home with internet access? TVs, smart speakers, doorcams, laptops, tablets, phones, desktops, smart watches, game consoles. Make a quick list of the devices your children use - what are they? Switch, Echo, X-box? Do they have their own smartphone?
Are any of these password protected? Do the kids know them?
Do any of them need accounts to operate properly? Nintendo accounts, Amazon Firestick?
Step 3) What do your children enjoy doing on them?
Hopefully through a mix of communication and physically checking the devices you’ll be able to work out what your child enjoys spending time on. It could be YouTube Minecraft videos, or Snapchat with their friends, or playing challenges on Roblox. If possible, let them show you what they enjoy doing, engage with them and play their games, watch their favourite videos.
Whatever it is, the app or platform will have a safety guide/parental controls of one kind or another.
Obviously children, especially older children/teenagers will be using a variety of apps, but we want to focus on simple, achievable steps.
What are the main activities your children spend time on:
Is it primarily one-way, eg are they just watching videos or scrolling a feed, or is it something they have to engage with, like a multiplayer game or a chat room?
Is it intended for children? Is there a children’s version of the same app?
Is it an app or feature that costs money? Are your card details loaded onto the app?
Step 4) What are the risks?
All parents and families are different, and they must all decide what they let their children do, play with, consume and who with. Its up to you to find out what the risks are and what you can do about it.
Groups like DigiShield Kids and others exist to educate and explain the different risks, use these resources.
The main risks can be broken down into a few groups:
Children watching/engaging with unsuitable content for their age group
People from outside the home having access to children through games, forums or chat apps - including friends
Invasion of privacy - children sending pictures, posting home address, apps monitoring and leaking private information, children falling for monetary scams
Physical and mental risks of excessive screen time, hyper-stimulating content, addictive scrolling apps, games cutting into study, social, sleep or exercise time
Each app has its own risks, and they differ by age group
Ultimately parents have to decide what they find acceptable. Simply by talking and engaging with your children whilst they’re gaming or watching, you might find out that they’re chatting with people they don’t know, or they’re watching inappropriate content, or they’re not doing their homework because of TikTok.
Step 5) Take simple actions
Now you’ve found out what your children do online, you can decide what to do about it. Here are five suggestions (feel free to modify or ignore, you’re the parent)
Introduce screen time limits, phone-down times for teenagers at night, family rules like ‘no screens at the table’, ‘no phones during game night or film night’. Many devices will have parental controls for screen time limits in the settings.
Use parental controls - most games/apps have features like disabling chats, blocking, filtering content, age-restrictions and spending limits. Here are some common ones, find more at www.internetmatters.org
Keep communicating - this is especially important with older children and teenagers. Remind and repeat basic common sense - don’t give out your name and address to people you don’t know, the internet doesn’t like secrets - don’t post things you don’t want others to see or hear, people lie about themselves online. Always reassure them they can come to you with anything, that you will help them fix it and be on their side, that everything has a solution.
Lead by example - you can’t convince them to stay off their screens if they see you always scrolling, monkey see monkey do.
Talk to other parents and teachers - lots of other parents have the same concerns and schools feel overwhelmed by the need to play catch-up with new technology and managing phones in the classroom. Initiatives like TakeThePledge and Smartphone Free Childhood make it easier to resist buying teenagers smartphones, since their friend’s parents have all agreed to wait until they are older.
We hope this simple guide will help you begin taking action, in whatever way works best for you and your family. Consider signing up to our newsletter (it’s free!) to receive more articles like this, news and clear research pieces about keeping children safe online.