THERE are more ways than ever to manage how your kids interact with tech – but for many parents, it’s definitely confusing.
But don’t panic: with the right settings, you can help to stave off some dangers. There are ways to keep predators at bay, limit the impact of cyberbullying, and save your child (and yourself) from huge bills. Here we reveal the nine rules to help keep your child safe online.
#1 Kids Accounts
The first thing you should do – above all else – is make sure that your youngster is only using “kid” accounts.
Many social media services, apps, and games that allow youngsters to play will have separate account types for youngsters.
And even your devices themselves should allow you to designate yourself as a parent to your child.
This is important for three reasons.
The first is that child accounts will generally have stronger protections built in by default – and some riskier features may simply be inaccessible.
The second is that it usually means you’ll be able to control their gadgets or accounts from your own parent account, which wouldn’t be possible if they were logged in as an “adult”.
And the third is that by having your youngster marked as a child, apps and games can more accurately detect other users that may be predators by seeing who they interact with.
How child accounts work varies from service to service.
But you’ll typically want to go into each app or game that they use, and make sure that they are signed in with their correct age.
Then make your own “parent” account and link it to your child’s.
Due to the Online Safety Act in the UK, most mainstream apps and services will already be age-vetting youngsters to prevent them from accessing inappropriate content.
#2 Screen Time
Many parents will limit their children’s screen time by telling them they’re only allowed an agreed-upon number of hours a week glued to an iPad, phone, or computer screen.
But you can also put limits on kids’ devices to lock them out if they’ve been on them too long.
There are two main ways to do this.
The first is at the device level, so think about your child’s iPhone or Android phone itself.
Go into your iPhone’s Settings, then choose [Name] > Family Sharing > Set Up Your Family, and then create a child user.
Now go onto your child’s device and tap into Settings > Screen Time > Family > Content & Privacy Restrictions.
You’ll need to enter a specific Screen Time passcode and turn the feature on.
Now you’ll be able to view your child’s usage and set limits.
You can get a weekly Screen Time report that reveals how much time your child is spending on their phone – and on what kind of apps.
There’s also a Downtime feature that lets you block apps and notifications for specific periods.
That might be useful if you want them to do homework, for instance.
“When you schedule downtime, only phone calls and apps that you choose to allow are available,” Apple explained.
“Downtime applies to all of your screen time-enabled devices, and you get a reminder five minutes before it starts.”
You could even set Downtime for a specific app – like a game they love playing – and limit it to just an hour a day.
And Downtime works across full app categories too, like games or social media.
On Android, you can access similar settings through Google‘s Family Link app.
#3 Guided Access
For very young children, there exists a brilliant feature called Guided Access.
This works even if they don’t have their own device.
For instance, you might want to let your youngster play a fun game on your iPhone or iPad – or maybe even just watch a video.
But you don’t necessarily feel safe that they won’t accidentally roam into other apps.
Guided Access lets you lock the screen down so that they can’t exit a specific app.
And you can even adjust it so that they can’t even interact with the screen using touch, which is handy if they’re just watching a video.
To set it up, go into Settings > Accessibility > Guided Access and activate the feature.
Then turn on the Accessibility Shortcut, which makes it much easier to switch on in an instant.
Next, load up the app that you want your child to use.
Then just triple-click the Side Button on your iPhone or iPad, and draw on the screen to restrict areas that you don’t want them to touch – or just lock out the entire screen.
If you want to unlock the iPhone from Guided Access, just triple-click the Side Button again, and you’ll be prompted to do a Face ID scan or enter your passcode.
#4 Content Restrictions
As usual, you can set up specific content restrictions inside apps and services.
For instance, you might want to use a PIN on Sky TV to limit what your kids can see.
And by restricting them to the YouTube Kids app instead of YouTube proper, you’ll be able to protect them from adult content.
But you can also set up device-level content restrictions.
Go into the Settings app, then tap on Screen Time, then go into Family, choose your child’s name, and then tap Content & Privacy Restrictions.
Then you’ll be able to limit all kinds of inappropriate content across apps and even the web.
You can set movies or TV shows to certain ratings.
And you can even limit them to “clean” books or apps that have specific age ratings.
You can then adjust them as they get older.
These settings also allow for specific whitelisting and blacklisting.
For instance, you could limit adult websites, but add an exception if you thought that something had been blocked unfairly.
And if you notice a website that wasn’t blocked but should’ve been, you can set it to Never Allow.
#5 Nudity Blocks
You’ve got a couple of options here.
In those same Screen Time settings, you can limit explicit content to block very adult media.
But you can also set up something called Communication Safety to help protect your youngster’s over text.
Go into Screen Time > [Your Child] > Communication Safety and then turn Communication Safety on
“If Communication Safety determines that a photo or video your child has received or is about to send appears to contain nudity, it blurs the photo or video and displays a warning,” Apple explained.
“This warning reassures the child that it’s OK not to view or send the content, and offers ways to get help.”
Apple says that these are the ways that your child might be offered help:
- Messaging a trusted adult
- Leaving the chat or group message
- Blocking the contact
- Viewing online safety resources
The downside here is that this applies specifically to Apple’s Messages app – and not WhatsApp.
However, Meta (which owns WhatsApp) has added a nudity protection feature to Instagram for direct messages to protect under 18s.
This automatic blurring is enabled by default for under 18s.
#6 Bill Blocks
You absolutely do not want to end up with a massive bill from your child’s online activities.
One option is to control it through your Screen Time controls via the iPhone.
Go into Settings > Screen Time > Content & Privacy Restrictions > iTunes & App Store Purchases.
Now you can choose the setting and change it to “Don’t Allow”.
And you can even set specific password settings for “additional purchases” across iTunes, the regular App Store, the Book Store, or the Apple TV app.
As well as that, you can change settings in specific apps too.
For instance, on Roblox, you can limit the amount of cash a child spends on the Robux virtual currency:
- Go to Settings
- Now go to Parental Controls
- Next, choose Settings You Manage
- Scroll down and choose Spending Restrictions
- Set a monthly spending limit (this won’t roll over!)
- Enable spending notifications and choose how often you want to be notified. The safest option is for every transaction
As well as that, you can set up limits on their game consoles regarding spending.
For Xbox, you’ll want to look at Microsoft accounts, as Microsoft owns Xbox.
Go into Settings > Account > Family Settings > Manage Family Members > Privacy & Online Safety > Xbox Live Privacy > View Details & Customise > Buy & Download, and set it to Ask A Parent.
That forces your child to get your permission before they can make a purchase on Xbox.
#7 Social Features in Games
Social settings can be harder to manage depending on your device.
If you have an iPhone then you can set up some device-level rules.
Your game consoles will usually have parental controls for social settings, which is handy as those rules will apply across all games.
That means you can limit who your child can talk to online in their games.
But if your youngster is playing on a PC, it becomes much harder – and you’ll likely have to dive into each individual multiplayer game to change the settings.
The settings will vary depending on the game, but you’ll typically want to restrict:
- Who can add them as friends
- Who can voice chat with them
- Who can message them
There are lots of other settings that might appear, and it’s worth discussing these with your youngster to see what’s appropriate.
But online gaming can be an aggressive place, so even adults will often turn off voice or text chat to avoid abuse.
So limiting access to public communications channels in games is a very good starting point.
#8 Chatbot Limits
This wouldn’t have been a problem a few years ago, but we are now in the age of AI, and your youngster might want to talk to chatbots.
Whether you let them or not is up to you.
They can be useful for education and teaching them how to use a tool that they might end up relying on at work one day, but they can also be linked to plenty of problems using them, even for adults.
The good news is that your general app restrictions at device level can be applied to chatbot apps like OpenAI‘s ChatGPT or Google Gemini.
And the other point to note is that many of the main chatbots offer parental controls too.
For ChatGPT, you can link your teen’s account to your own.
Go into Settings > Settings > Parental Controls > Add Family Member, then invite your teen.
Then you’ll be able to make changes around the following:
- Reducing sensitive content
- Being used to improve the model
- References to saved memories
- Voice Mode
- Image generation
- Quite hours
- Settings linked to the Sora video engine
You might also receive a safety notification if the systems or trained reviewers “detect activity that may indicate certain serious safety concerns involving self-harm”.
It’s also possible to set up parental controls for Google’s Gemini.
You can control their access to apps through Family Link, which is Google’s way of letting you manage a child’s account.
#9 Eye Safety
This one is a little different from the others on the list, but it’s still a parental control – and is important.
It’s easy to focus on content restriction and time limits, and miss a key setting designed to protect your child’s eyesight.
The feature is called Screen Distance, and it’s tucked away in the Screen Time settings I mentioned earlier.
“Screen Distance detects when a device is being held too close for an extended period, and gives prompts when it’s recommended that you move your iPhone or iPad further away from your face,” Apple said.
“Screen Time encourages younger users to engage in healthy viewing habits that can lower their risk of myopia, and it can help reduce eye strain for users of all ages.”
The system is specifically looking for your child (or yourself) holding the device closer than 12 inches to their face for an extended period.
So turning this feature on can be a real help when it comes to maintaining good eye health.
