Tracking DP on phone

[damekindness]

I was talking to some work colleagues today and it came up in conversation that they got their OH to turn on their 'share location' on their mobiles so they could see where they were. Apparently it's useful to know so they can get the dinner on the table ready for them

Aside from the whole being a domestic dinner slave issue, I think asking your OH to share their location so they can be tracked is a massive invasion of privacy. However the counter argument was that if they didn't have anything to hide they shouldn't mind....

How would having a tracking app stop you getting surprise presents?

We turn ours on when one of us is on a long journey, means the traveller doesn't feel the need to update on progress. We usually just use Google maps, is that what you mean?

We all have it and it’s useful. I like to think that if I rang dh at any time and asked where he was he’d tell me without issue and vice versa, my life is so routine around work and kids anyway it’s not like I’m doing anything interesting. If dh did track me on a night out and start questioning what I was doing, then yes that would be misuse and I’d turn it off. But he wouldn’t. We don’t need to keep our location private and it’s quicker than texting where are you. If one of the kids got lost I could find them or if they forget to let me know whose house they’ve gone to after school I can see.

We have ours on because we both get anxious if the other is late. Knowing the other is still in the office is helpful and stops the anxiety. Never occurred to me it was weird.

We did have to remove my mum as she kept pressing her panic button if she wanted something (e.g. pick up butter from shop) and it was driving me and my siblings mad as we'd get urgent alerts and texts and then panic.

I use it too. DH often gets stuck at work and is unable to message. It means I can see he’s at work and not stuck in traffic or lying in a ditch somewhere.

We call ours the stalker app. We can all track each other (me, DH and two teenagers). I would find texts or calls more invasive actually, so i guess it's horses for courses. Although obviously I've been on MN long enough to know that's a ludicrous idea and anyone who doesn't think the same as you is wrong.

My immediate family knowing where I am doesn't seem to be remotely the same as the government tracking me, but "Hey Preston" made me smile.

How can you tell from the tracker if someone is lying in a ditch as opposed to stuck in traffic?

We have find my friends on iphone. We don’t really use it, but could if needed. But it is about what works for you and your own relationship really. We know each other’s passcodes and passwords to various things as it is just how we are, but would have had no issue if DH didn’t want to share them.

My dh cycles through city, woods and country roads. The worst driving is along the country roads which gets very little traffic. If he's stationary there and late , he's in a ditch.

He has been knocked odd once along said road.

I can't imagine this either. I sometimes miss the days when you couldn't even be rung when you were out and about. I can see it could be practical but it's outweighed by the creepiness factor for me. Surely an adult is entitled to a little autonomy? I am not about to embark on any kind of affair but if I want to pop into TK Maxx on my way home or stay for one extra glass of wine and risk missing a particular train home, I don't especially want to be accountable to anyone to that minute degree, and nor would I expect dh to be.

It's not for me, but I don't judge others if it works for them.

I'm old enough to have been a young adult before mobile phones, although I have always worked in a technology environment and love it.

I don't need to know where my DH is at any point in time. A simple 'I'm in London today, back around x works for me'. Equally I don't look at his phone, know his passwords or open his mail. And vice versa.

We don't have any trust issues but I don't need to know everything and I like my privacy. And I certainly don't need to know where my grown up children are, friends, sister etc. And if you are tracking locations, then others know your location too.

I'm not convinced about tracking teenagers - someone mentioned having 'a right' to track them. I think people need space to grow and be independent. They don't need parents checking they've arrived safely at school....

As a teenager my friends and I used to be dropped off at the church youth club on a Friday night and be picked up a few hours later. We very rarely stayed there for long but were always back at pick up time! We were about 14 and lots of fun to be had meeting boys from school etc. No harm done and we all laugh about it now. (And no, we didn't lie to our parents...we just didn't mention we hadn't been there the whole time 😀). This wouldn't be possible nowadays.

We’ve got Find My Friends enabled permanently. By mutual agreement. It’s come in genuinely handy on some occasions. As long as it’s mutual I don’t see the problem.

People are very het up at the idea of this. We have ours on, nobody is being stalked, I think that would require us to follow behind and spy on them, not look at their location from the comfort of the sofa.
It’s useful if your phone is stolen. I have a few friends on it too.

Aren't people mixing up the two things here?

1. find my iPhone: something you enable, so if you lose your phone you can log onto your account on a computer or another phone with your email and password to see where it is. Only you possess the log in details so nobody can use that to track you.

2. find my friends. Which is where you actively select friends to share your location with.

Location services on your settings needs switching on to use either of these but they're not remotely the same thing!

FWIW I couldn't imagine allowing anyone to see where I am at all times whether they checked or not. It just disturbs me. I want to be able to go where I please without knowing someone else can literally track me as if I've been chipped or had a tracker placed on my car. Where's the privacy? Nor would I want to have the ability to track OH. I know people say it doesn't matter if you're not doing anything dodgy but the fact it doesn't feel at all weird or intrusive to some people to know someone can track them says a lot I think about how far we've accepted being monitored.

Also at the idea of tracking teenagers and letting them grow up thinking it's normal to be able to see where your loved ones are at all times! Let them have their freedom and learn how to act in the world without knowing mum or dad can see where they are every minute of the day. I'd have been aghast as a teenager if my mum had suggested this. That's really disturbing to me but I can see that's not a universal view. Never seen one of these threads before so it has been a massive surprise to see how many people are fine with this!

@DiegoMadonna you might be right about the anxiety generally. But for me, as my was so binary, ‘something catastrophic has happened!’ Being able to see where people are has completely taken away the source of my anxiety the what if...
I’ve not checked anyone’s whereabouts this morning, although I’ve been up for a few hours. I last used it last night when I was off to bed; I could see dd18 was nearby and on a bus, so I went to sleep, not having to text or call to see whether she was near.
In the week dp works and lives overseas. I can see and chide him for being late in the office, send him a text to say ‘yay, you’re done, how’s the flat?’ etc. He could be up to all sorts tracking doesn’t stop that, and isn’t an issue.

We have find my friends and we have both sets of parents on there too. Everyone agrees. No one feels they are being stalked. MIL lives alone and my dad has a history of falling over and ending up in hospital so they both see it as a a sort of safety feature. I work late nights and travel alone. DH travels a lot for work.

None of us check it countless times a day (my dad might but only because he has nothing better to do!) and there are no trust issues. We use it as a practical help in certain situations. Nothing more!

I wonder if the people who think it's creepy are phoning and texting through the day? I think that is needy and a massive pain in the arse. I couldn't be bothered giving DH updates whenever I leave the office.

I'm quite happy for him to check what bus I'm on via an app though, if he wants to know so he can plan dinner etc. And vice versa.

We share our locations and have trust and there's no control in our relationship. I'm really busy and DH can't keep track of where I am, occasionally comes home and we're not there so he can now see (if I'm driving I can't answer). Same for him with his commute. Rarely use it but useful when we do.

@Walking
Also hmm at the idea of tracking teenagers and letting them grow up thinking it's normal to be able to see where your loved ones are at all times!

They ‘track’ dozens of friends. On a big night out or travelling it saves a lot of time and is a source of lots of joshing when those pins turn up in expected places...
It’s also completely ok to not share locations. Lots of people don’t, there’s already a culture of it being completely fine to disable it on work phones when not working or refuse to be tracked bar safety reasons.

I wonder if there are any statistics on how many people in an abusive relationship had this technology used against them by the abusive partner. Imagine being so controlled that even when they're at work or away for a weekend, they can still track your every move. Clearly it can be used for non nefarious purposes in healthy relationships but I do think it's worth thinking through the potential implications of this stuff being so normalised and available to everybody and how that may lead to further risk to people in a domestic abuse situation.

People saying it's only acceptable to track your teenagers.
Don't you even see THAT as weird? Think of it when you were a teen. Would you have liked your parents to put a tracker device on you? I wouldn't, even though I was never doing anything interesting anyway!
It's intrusive.

Frechknitting - I think you could be right! DH and I rarely text except something functional. Recently went on holiday with DH's family and his sis was constantly sending texts / emojis to partner. DH thought that was so weird (what's a 50 year old doing sending hundreds of texts and emojis back and forth). He found it utterly bizarre. Each to their own imo, but he found it totally weird!

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jan/25/spyware-smartphone-abusive-men-track-partners-domestic-violence

41% of women's aid survey respondents say their partner used technology to track their movements and communications. Jesus.

It'll be so much easier when we have microchips implanted under our skin for tracking and paying for stuff.

All sorts of normalised everyday things can be used in the wrong way by an abusive arsehole.