Is DH being unreasonable to want to be able to look at his 11-year-old DD's mobile phone?

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My 11-year-old stepdaughter has just started secondary school and has got her first mobile phone. My husband has asked her for her lock screen PIN, so he can keep an eye on her messages and web browsing to make sure she's not talking to anybody untoward or looking at anything inappropriate. She has refused to tell him. Communication between DH and his ex is poor, so we don't know whether she is monitoring DSD's phone activity (though, even if she is, I think DH would want to have the ability to do so himself - we have DSD almost 50% of the time, including for extended periods in school holidays, so her mum won't always be around to check the phone). Is he being reasonable in wanting to be able to keep an eye on what his 11-year-old daughter is up to on social media?

12 Year old DD’s phone rules:

1. While I pay for it, it’s mine, I’m lending it to you for you to use.

1. Because it’s mine, I know ALL access codes or I take it off you and I stop paying for it.

1. I have the right to check it at any time.

1. Do not write down anything you wouldn’t say to someone’s face. Once it’s written it’s out there for anyone to see.

1. It’s never in your room overnight (I charge it next to my bed).

1. NEVER EVER accept a friend request from someone you don’t know in reality. So and so’s cousins mates aunties dog should not be your online friend.

She’s happy with these rules and I do check it.

Alliwing your 11 year old child open unserpervised access to the internet is fairly poor parenting (but sadly the case for most students I see). in my day inappropriate material was perusing through your older brothers porn mag you’d found, or a semi dirty movie on channel 5.

Today your just s few clicks away from videos of beheadings, shooting children and people being violated by a horse....So no, an 11 year old has no place having unchecked access to the internet. God bless Tim Berners-lee 👍

I almost forgot, Two girls one cup... once seen it can never be erased 😫

No not at all unreasonable. I check my dd's phone most days.

My very trustworthy and well behaved 11 yo DD was cagey about letting me see her phone once. I kept asking to see it, checking messages/photos etc to make sure there was nothing untoward on there. However I was still suspicious. I was checking through my bank statement and saw lots of little (£5/6) payments to iTunes. Turns out DD has been buying in-app purchases on some stupid game to the total of about £100

She is literally the last kid you would expect to do something like that, but it was addictive. Even though she clearly knew she’d done something wrong, she kept doing it.

Please do make sure your H checks his DD’s phones. These days a few game expenses are the least of our worries as parents.

Game expenses! I hadn't even thought of that - and, although she's very mature for an 11-year-old, I'm not sure she'd fully understand in-app purchases or the fact that you can incur real-life costs just by clicking a button.

I think DH needs to speak to either DSD, or her mum, about getting the PIN as a condition of DSD continuing to have access to her phone at our house. Thanks, all, for providing a sense check.

Out of interest, at what age would you start relaxing your monitoring? I almost feel like the risks get greater as the teenager gets older, in terms of likelihood to respond to a groomer posing as a teenage boy etc. Should we say we'd expect access to her phone until she is 16, or should we just play it by ear and see how we get on over the next couple of years?

I don't have DC of my own yet (currently pregnant with my first), so this is all new to me!

It is also a condition in our house that we know the DCs pin numbers, they don't need to share with each other but we definitely still monitor at 12 and 10 I would probably ease off at 13/14.

I think 16 is a bit old to have access till. I can't imagine invading a 15/16 YOs privacy.

He is not being unreasonable. Condition of having phone (DD14) is that I get to look whenever I randomly wish to and no aspects are private. If she wants privacy she can scrawl in a diary - phones are way too unsecure in terms of who can send/receive info. It will also keep DD own behaviour a bit in check I reckon if they know they may be called out on it. Good luck!

I’d play it by ear. You can relax things and check less frequently but if she knows you might check, even if rarely, she’ll hopefully carry on with good habits.

FWIW DP’s DD left her phone connected to her friend overnight using data instead of WiFi (or something - not sure of the exact story she fed him!) and ran up an £80 bill too.

Luckily phone companies seem to be quite understanding when it happens once, but I’m sure a repeat performance wouldn’t be refunded!

definitely not unreasonable, 11 is too young for a phone like that anyway imo

DD is 15/just starting yr 11.

We still have access to her phone as a condition of us paying the bill.

If anything it's even more important this year that she's not distracted by social media bullshit!

We might review that once she's at 6th form/a-level age, but til then, it's that or no phone.

if she wants private conversations with her friends, she can have them in person.

Perfectly reasonable imo. 11 year old is a vulnerable age.

No
This is how bullying occurs with hands off parents allowing kids to have privacy.
Keep looking and get every restriction on internet access to dodgy sites and sites that encourage self harm/porn etc etc.

I'd recommend setting up Google Family on her phone. The app on your phone allows you to check the location of your DSD's phone (and her), see what she's using her phone for, and set a bedtime for e.g. my DS11's phone goes off at 10pm

If my 11 year old refused to tell me their pin the would not have a phone. End of conversation.

Relaxing the rules will happen as and when I think it’s right. This could be anywhere between 14 ish to when she leaves home

Agree with pps. I check dd's whenever I choose and if she refused she wouldn't have a phone.
Re sneaking a tablet upstairs- turn Wi-Fi off when you go to bed.

@farrahmoan - Thank you - Google Family is how we control tablet usage (after finding out that she was sneaking it upstairs without our knowledge, we've locked it down so she can't use it after 10pm). Sadly, to be able to install Google Family, we would presumably need to be able to operate the phone, which we can't do if she won't share her PIN! I think we will have to just be firm - if she doesn't share her PIN, she doesn't get to use the phone in our house, end of. Once she shares her PIN we can set up basic safeguarding controls and keep an eye on who she is chatting to. She doesn't use Facebook or Insta, and I haven't seen her using any other social media apps when we are within eyesight, but I know she uses WhatsApp to talk to her friends, so we really do need to be able to keep an eye on who she has in her contacts.

Did he pay for it, if so HINBU

Where does an 11 year old get the idea that they are entitled to privacy from their parents?

You are joking op

It called be a parent in fact you are being unreasonable for not looking and neglectful

My friend allowed her daughter privacy ended up getting a dic pic sent to her at the age of 11 and nearly meetup with the guy

@1981fishgut We want to look. So far DSD is refusing to share the PIN with her father. She only got the phone last week! We don't know what arrangement she has with her mother. Next time we have her, we will be insisting that she shares her PIN or she won't get to use the phone. I just wanted to check we weren't being unreasonable.

You could confiscate it while she is with you other than to ring her mother then her mother can't complain. I too would want access. Not to say that you would necessarily scroll through all her messages every time, but being able to check is important.