Spying on Your Kids: 80% of Parents Track Their Children's Locations and Online Activities [Survey]
All About Cookies surveyed U.S. parents to learn how many track their children’s online activities and physical location, and what the most popular methods are.
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Parenting is difficult, and the internet has made it tougher than ever. Knowing who your children are speaking with and what they’re doing both online and offline is important, but the ever-evolving technical landscape and children's rising technical literacy can make it hard to stay on top of things.
At the same time, technology has given parents more tools than ever to keep an eye on what their kids are doing. But how many parents actually take advantage of these tools? What’s the line between tracking and spying?
To get a better understanding of how people monitor their children in our increasingly digital age, All About Cookies surveyed parents to see how many check up on their kids’ online activity, real-world locations, and more.
Key findings:
80% of parents check their children's location, including 54% who check it frequently. More than 1 in 3 parents do it without letting their children know.
54% of parents monitor their kids’ texts and 76% of parents have access to their children’s phone password.
The majority of parents (64%) have caught their children doing something they shouldn't because of tracking.
76% of parents say tracking their kids on and offline behaviors has led them to make better choices.
The internet gives everyone access to information and perspectives from people around the world. Unfortunately, not everyone has the best intentions or behavior online, which is why it’s important for parents to track what their kids are doing online and who they’re talking to.
The majority of parents recognize the need to track digital activities and communications, as 78% of parents check on their child’s text messages and messaging apps, social media accounts and posts, screen time, banking and financial accounts, browsing history, email, and gaming history. This includes more than half of parents who say they check messaging and social media accounts frequently.
While the majority of parents track their kids’ online activities, not everyone is letting their kids know about it. More than one-third of parents (35%) who monitor their children’s online activity say they do so without letting their children know they’re keeping tabs on what they do online.
We also found that knowing children’s passwords is a key element to online tracking for many parents. More than half of parents (59%) say they know the passwords for their children’s social media accounts, while more than two-thirds (68%) know their children’s email passwords and more than three-quarters of parents (76%) know how to unlock their children’s cell phones.
How parents track kids’ locations
The internet is not the only place kids can get into trouble, of course, so we also wanted to see how many parents take advantage of modern technology to keep tabs on their children’s location when they’re out of the house.
The vast majority of parents, a whopping 80%, say that they use some form of monitoring to track where their children are when they’re apart. Two-thirds say they don’t just track location but also use technology to monitor and review their child’s driving history.
The most common way that parents track their kids is by using the built-in tracking functionality in their children’s cell phone, such as Find My on iPhones and Find My Device on Androids. 58% of parents say they use these default programs to monitor where their children are, while a similar percentage (53%) use dedicated family monitoring apps such as Life360 or Glympse.
When it comes to letting their kids know that somebody is watching them, 39% of parents choose not to tell their children that their location is being monitored. That's a higher percentage than the proportion of parents that track their kids’ online activities without telling them.
Does tracking work?
With so many parents watching what their kids are doing, how many have actually caught their children breaking the rules online or IRL (in real life)?
Between the internet and the real world, nearly two out of every three parents (64%) say they have caught their children doing something they shouldn’t thanks to monitoring efforts. That includes 22% who have caught their kids breaking the rules online, 18% who have found them doing something they shouldn’t in the real world, and nearly a quarter (24%) who have busted their children in both the digital and physical realms.
The impact of tracking kids
Knowing that parents catching their kids red-handed thanks to technology and monitoring efforts is fairly common, the final piece of the puzzle we wanted to examine was the impact that being tracked has on kids.
More than three out of every four parents who monitor their children in some way (76%) say that monitoring their kids has led their children to make better decisions, either because they know they’re being watched or because they’ve been caught before. That improved decision-making is almost certainly a factor as to why nearly half of parents (49%) say that tracking their children’s activities has had a positive impact on their relationship with their children.
Advice from our experts
We have our data from parents spying on their children’s tech, but we wanted experts to weigh in on the effects and ethics of parents’ surveillance of their kids’ devices.
Do you believe developers creating tracking software for kids' devices can be considered an invasion of privacy?
I do think tracking software on children's devices hedges toward an invasion of privacy. I am not sure tracking software meet the legal criteria of invasion of privacy, but it does represent an invasion of trust. Parents and children establish a sense of trust by having a strong relationship. If parents have to rely on tracking software to verify a child's truthfulness of where they are, then something is broken in the relationship. Kids have a right to be kids and sometimes that means being places unsupervised. Tracking software is not a resolution for a poor relationship.
What effects, if any, can constant surveillance have on a child's development?
Constant surveillance undermines a child's sense of autonomy and self-efficacy. Kids need experience managing situations on their own to feel self-efficacy, that they can control the environment. When kids are deprived of these opportunities of managing on their own, they become fearful, anxious, and indecisive. In order for kids to become successful adults who can manage life, let alone adversity, they need those opportunities to resolve situations without parental intervention.
Do you have any tips for parents wanting to keep their kids safe in the digital age without invading their child's privacy?
First, parents need to be reminded that our world is safer now than in the past. Occurrences are so rare that they get sensationalized by news media when they do occur.
Second, parents need to give kids chances to interact in the world without their intervention. Have kids order on their own in restaurants. Have kids purchase something in the store or do some grocery shopping on their own. Have kids go to the movies with friends on their own. Have kids play on the playground without parental hovering.
Research is consistent that kids know what to do when they receive inappropriate solicitation via digital contact. Parents should have conversations regularly about interactions online. Just like parents get to know face-to-face friends — parents can inquire about virtual friends as well. The best tracking software is a strong relationship.
Some responses may have been slightly edited for clarity and brevity.
What effects, if any, can constant surveillance have on a child's development?
Parental control apps are only one way children can be surveyed and monitored. The ability to monitor our children and the expectation that our children are being watched and monitored has been happening for years. For example, it is no longer acceptable for children to explore cities or towns or freely walk or bike to friends’ houses without adults supervising them. This has been true for years and I do think it has limited children’s ability to have independence and explore the world on their own terms.
Parental control apps like Life 360 are a way of monitoring and tracking children while they are separated from you. In that way it gives children more independence than if you insisted that they are always being directly supervised in person. However, it is usually used for older teens who, in previous generations, would have been able to drive, explore, and have adventures without any parental supervision or without their parents knowing where they are. Life 360 is simply an extension of the norms that have shifted around parenting. It is hard to go against these norms because parents have been trained to think that supervising and knowing where their children are is a sign of good parenting. I tend to think we are not going back unless there is a huge change in parenting norms where “free range” parenting becomes more normative and acceptable.
In terms of the direct effects on children’s development of Life 360 – I think there are advantages and disadvantages. Advantages include the fact that parents may actually allow their children more freedom to have adventures and explore (e.g., take a train into the city with friends) if they know that they will be able to know where they are in an emergency. I think it is useful when children are new drivers to be able to see where they are and how fast they are driving. I think there is also an advantage because children can track their parents and know where they are if they need something.
The disadvantages are the same as the disadvantages of our general cultural shift toward monitoring and surveillance. Children may feel as though they are being micromanaged, they may be given the message that the world is not safe and that they cannot have freedom unless they are being monitored.
I admit that both of my teens are on Life 360 and I think it is useful as they are new drivers. I don’t think there are negative effects on them above and beyond the more general negative effects of living in a culture where children are given less freedom to explore independently overall. Putting them on Life 360 has corresponded with an increase in freedom and autonomy for them because they are now driving and going places without adult supervision.
However, I think there are also disadvantages for the parent. Since I can track them I find that sometimes I watch them as they are driving. This simply causes me stress and anxiety. I have found that I am a much happier person when I am not checking Life 360 when my children are driving and simply trust that they are driving safely and getting where they need to go.
I think the calculus is different when children turn 18 and move out of the house. When my son goes to college, especially since he won’t have a car, I am thinking of turning off Life 360. This is more for my sake than for his. He said he doesn’t care and it doesn’t bother him at all. But I don’t want to spend my time checking to see if he is going to class or wondering if he is spending too much or too little time in his dorm or too little time in the library. I think this will cause me undue anxiety and I do think that he deserves some privacy.
Do you personally have any tips for parents wanting to keep their kids safe online?
I do think there is a real balance between keeping children safe and respecting their autonomy and privacy. I think how much you monitor your children’s online activity depends on how old your child is, your tolerance for uncertainty, and your trust that your child is making good decisions online and you feel they would reach out to you if something bad happens to them online that requires parental intervention. Every parent knows their own child so each parent will make their own decision. However, I think the following are good practices:
Set rules for phone use. For example, you may wish to say no phones at dinner or in the bedroom. It is a good idea for phones to charge outside of the bedroom if that works for your family.
Have an open conversation with your children about what is and is not appropriate to share online. A lot of this information is already being discussed in schools so talk to your children about what they are learning and make sure they understand the importance of making good decisions.
Encourage your children to find ways to set their own rules and norms for phone use. Eventually they are going to have to manage their relationship with their phones as we all do. One of my children voluntarily put time limits for himself on certain apps after he realized he was spending too much time on them.
Be a good role model for phone use. If you are on your phone all day that is what children will learn to do. Openly discuss your own struggles with social media and online activity. I recently deleted Facebook from my phone because I realized I was spending too much time on it and it was not healthy for me. I discussed this with my children and they were very supportive and it prompted a great discussion about their own goals for their phone use.
Give your children as much autonomy as you feel comfortable with and you feel is appropriate for your family.
Some responses may have been slightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Tips for keeping your children safe online
There are plenty of steps you can take to make sure your children remain safe online:
Secure their accounts with a password manager. Having secure passwords makes it hard to remember all your login information. If you have a lot of accounts to manage, look into using a password manager to keep everything secure and organized.
Check on the best parental control apps. See how your tracking method stacks up against some other top brands with our best parental control app comparison page.
Methodology
All About Cookies surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults via the Pollfish platform in July 2024. Answers were limited to respondents with children under the age of 18.
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Josh Koebert is an experienced content marketer that loves exploring how tech overlaps with topics such as sports, food, pop culture, and more. His work has been featured on sites such as CNN, ESPN, Business Insider, and Lifehacker.