August 11, 2022 – Snapchat, as part of its child safety efforts, has launched a new tool that allows parents to monitor who their child is chatting with on the app, keeping the contents of the conversation private.
Snapchat’s first-ever parental controls, called Family Center, will give parents and guardians limited access to their teens’ activities on the popular photo-sharing platform. Snap’s child safety tool comes in the wake of mounting criticism social media companies are facing from regulators and lawmakers for exposing young users to harmful content.
“Snapchat is a central communications tool for young people, and as our community continues to grow, we know parents and caregivers want additional ways to help keep their teens safe,” Snapchat’s parent company, Snap, said in a blog post. “That’s why we’re introducing a new in-app tool called Family Center, which will help parents get more insight into who their teens are friends with on Snapchat, and who they have been communicating with, without revealing any of the substance of those conversations.”
Parents will need to install Snapchat on their own devices to use Family Center and an invite must be accepted by both parents and the child in order to link their accounts. Family Center will allow parents and guardians to see their child’s friends list as well as a list of accounts they have been having conversations with over the last seven days.
Accounts that may be concerning can be reported to Snap’s Trust and Safety teams.
“Family Center is designed to reflect the way that parents engage with their teens in the real world, where parents usually know who their teens are friends with and when they are hanging out – but don’t eavesdrop on their private conversations,” said Snap. “In the coming weeks, we will add a new feature that will allow parents to easily view new friends their teens have added.”
Snap will add additional features to Family Center later this year. They will include content controls for parents and the ability for teens to notify their parents when they report an account or particular information to the company.
“While we closely moderate and curate both our content and entertainment platforms, and don’t allow unvetted content to reach a large audience on Snapchat, we know each family has different views on what content is appropriate for their teens and want to give them the option to make those personal decisions.”
Snapchat first announced the development of child safety tools in October last year.
