AIBU to ask my mum to stop WhatsApping baby photos?

Despite her age my great aunt has a very active social life. She travels and volunteers and has WhatsApp groups related to those hobbies. I have no idea who is on her WhatsApp contacts. It could just be her old ladies friends. It could be Tom who also volunteers at the same charity. I don't know and I'm not comfortable with people I don't know having pictures of my kids on their phone. We could argue on and on about theoretical risk but I'm uncomfortable with that and stand by that.

I don't think you're being unreasonable, OP.

She may be just an unidentifiable baby right now, but at what cutoff age does her right to privacy kick in? And if Granny is sharing photos now, how can she be stopped when that age is reached? And if Granny is simply ignoring your boundaries, what other boundaries will she just ignore?

What do you think your great aunts WhatsApp contacts would do with a photo accidentally set as profile of a random baby by what I can only assume is an old lady?

is your great aunt involved in sex trafficking of children? Or do you think there’s a group of people looking on WhatsApp - for photos of babies (which is of course, the only place they might come across the rare phenomena of ‘a snapshot of a baby’)
they are then going to cast Take a break magazine to begin to digitally manipulate it to do what?

Some people are actually bonkers. Bonkers.

I suppose the app you’re happy with won’t work for the recipient, WhatsApp is universal and also encrypted.

I think you need to consider the actual risk. She sounds like she’s sending them to trusted friends and family. Your baby could easily be captured in some random person’s photos at any time, you can’t control pictures you don’t know are being taken. What about wedding photos where people (shock horror) have been allowed to bring their children? What about CCTV when you go shopping as a family?

I share your concern generally but I’ve come to accept we no longer live in a world where you can expect privacy. If you don’t want your baby photos circulated, don’t share them. It seems a bit mean though.

Ok this changes my original view, your mum clearly failed you, but you are an adult now so she can respect your rules. I would not be sending her any more pictures. She is hardly in a position to judge what is and isn't OK. FWIW I bet people just delete them, the pics maybe your mum's pride and joy but they probably just take up memory space in a random person's phone.

Can you explain the benefit from sending baby's pictures? Is it a benefit for op, for the baby of for grandma?

I thought you were absolutely batshit until I saw your update. After that I think she’s lucky to even still be in your life (and therefore her grandchild’s) and should do absolutely anything she can to keep herself in your lives, even if it means following rules she doesn’t agree with.

I text photos to my friends, that’s probably riskier than using an encrypted platform like WhatsApp. Do you not worry about the security aspect when you send them to your mum @embroideredpanda? Or is it just insecure when she sends them on the same platform? What’s the difference?

Becoming a grand parent is one of those big life stages. Part of it is showing people pictures of the new born. She is most likely doing it from a place of look at me I have joined the club.having received photos from the random distant. In days past there would have been a well thumbed baby picture in her purse and relatives would have turned up on your doorstep to see the baby in person. You would have been expected to go to the grandparents homes so they could have an open house so their friends and your distants could admire the baby and your parents new status as a grandparent.

Sharing on What's App is the modern form of these social norms. It is encrypted end to end and it is easier to crack into your Google account where they are stored than to use any images for AI image doctoring that may occur between what's app accounts.

So sorry to hear this happened to you and I can understand why you are incredibly protective of your baby especially with your mum who betrayed you on a massive scale, that trust is gone and likely never to return.

I think this context may have been better explained earlier in the thread because it highlights why you have set the boundaries that you have, especially with your mum, posters responses to you would have bene very different if they knew the background and you would have prevented unnecessary distress form their take on things.

I used to work on child protection related cases, specifically involving CSA. I completely understand where you’re coming from regarding awareness of risk - but, if you analyse the risk factors here, the biggest risk would be photos openly shared on social media (which you avoid). The risk of photos being compromised from WhatsApp are very low, and would require the person on the other end to be using them for nefarious purposes, which is also unlikely in the circumstances (but because it’s something you deal with everyday you’re probably dealing with heightened awareness).

Weigh it up - is more harm going to come from your child having the occasional baby photo sent via WhatsApp to a relative, or from having a poor relationship with their family (because, rightly or wrongly, speaking from similar experiences with friends, it always has a knock on affect).

Precious much! I get social media but how odd to stop a GM sharing the joy with friends. Will you also ban discussion of the aforesaid child.

Babies absolutely not look all the same.

Hope you dont really mean this as it would be shocking.

Utter controlling weird batshittery.

And those backing you up are just as bad.

Get over yourself.

I’m so sorry you experienced that OP.

Tell her no more photos as she can’t be trusted.

A lot of people these days seem to think they’re celebrities and behave as such. It’s a bit weird.

cross posted

Op, I’m really sorry about what happened to you,

I think that is a much bigger issue.

a pp said that you had been clear. I disagree - as you have seen from this thread many people do not see WhatsApp as social media.

i’d suggest that you actually are clear - eg I am happy to send these pictures but I don’t want you to send them on to anyone else by any means

Lots of people on here argue that the that the risk is small. It may be but so is the benefit. What harm is going to happen if grandma doesn't share pictures of her gc with her buddies from the hiking group. Yes grandma will have to restrain herself. That's what a lot of adults do. I refrained from sharing the news about my sister's high risk pregnancy until she was confortable sharing it herself, no matter my excitement. My brother is ND and doesn't like to be hugged or touched for long, so I refrain from hugging him. I also refrain from gossiping about my friends private life because it would make them uncomfortable. I don't go on about them being controlling or alienating.
I'm not sure why a person's excitement or pleasure should trump someone's discomfort or boundaries.

YANBU. Same thing happened with my mum although it wasn’t even family friends, it was people she knew I expressly didn’t like or people I didn’t know at all. It’s one of the many reasons we are barely on speaking terms anymore.

Regardless of anyone’s views on whether you’re being too precious or controlling, you have asked your mum not to do something and she should listen. A few people have suggested that you are risking your relationship with her, but she is also risking her relationship with you by continuing to do something you are deeply uncomfortable with. In light of your last post, I think you need to have a meaningful conversation with her about your very understandable feelings around the fact that she didn’t protect you as a child.

The thing is, you’ve been made aware of the concerns about online images being exploited via your job so you have a heightened sense of anxiety about this happening to your baby too. That’s pretty standard - I too have a career with children and also have this safeguarding knowledge. But I also know that the vast majority of children do not suffer from abuse.
I’m assuming that neither yourself of your child’s father takes any photos of your child on a digital camera? So your DM must be taking these photos herself? Of course it’s up to you if you don’t want any photos taken of your child, but what would be hypocritical would be if you’re taking them, sending them to your DM and telling her not to pass them on to her friends via WhatsApp. Does the baby’s father feel the same as you? Have you sent anyone else photos of your baby, ever?

Ok so this adds colour to your post! I wouldn’t let them have any unsupervised contact. Christ! She has form for failing you

Normalising this behaviour under the guise of safeguarding is how you create issues and conflict within a family and ultimately break it up. If we all had great, proximal relationships with our family members, we might rely on them for free childcare instead of paying someone to do it. We wouldn't need to purchase and consume as much as we do if we lived in larger family units. We wouldn't be as individualistic and those of us with lots would help those we know with much less so we all had something.

This doesnt work for a capitalist society so ensuring that people like the OP distrust and rest their parents means that they won't rely on each other for support and will outsource all that familial care to paid providers.

It makes sense to make OP think her mum is a selfish perv instead of a doting grandmother. She will probably buy 3 books about abusive parents and hire a nanny.

How utterly ridiculous! What about when your baby gets photographed in the background at parks, or parties, or soft play? Your kid isn't different or special. No one cares. Your Mum will be sending the pics to her friends and relatives. They won't be finding their way onto the dark web FFS. I honestly don't know how some people get through life with such ridiculous anxiety. Unclench and stop spoiling this for your Mum, who is excited about her grandchild. 🙄