Aibu - not to know how to deal with DD's secret Instagram account

[seriouslylong]

My dd is 12, she has asked me for an instagram account lots of times and I said no. I recently found out she created an account without telling me.

I was going to tell her right away that I knew and deal with it but I decided to monitor it for a few days.

Now I have seen she has posted photos of herself in a bikini which she knows is unacceptable. I now feel like I can't trust her.

I will be swapping her phone for a brick phone, but I'm not sure how else to deal with this as she completely went behind my back with this and then took it much further by putting up bikini photos of herself.

[unmumsymumof2]

I don't think the phone or internet should be taken away from her.

Building a wall between you at this age is not going to help either of you now or in the near future.

Yes she's done wrong but I think she needs to be told the dangers of Instagram, grooming, all the perverts out there and be closely monitored with a warning that if it happens again, then it will be confiscated.

At 12/13 she's got to be high school age, I don't know anyone at high school who doesn't have some sort of social media. I think you need to let her have it but monitor the content she's posting.

[NuttyOrNice]

Working click link for google play parental controls.
Google play Parental Controls.

NSPCC info on parental controls

UK SAFER INTERNET CENTRE advice about Parental controls

[GreenTulips]

You can tell her you’ve seen screen shots of her instagram account.

You could also get a panda box installed £70 to restrict her access online - it’s the beat one I’ve seen

[NuttyOrNice]

BTW. I’m fully aware that parental controls can not protect your kids completely. Kids can be bullied or groomed by text sent on the most basic phone available.

[TripleTKA]

I also don’t think banning from the internet/losing the phone is the best option either.....at that age life is so unfair and they can’t see the woods for the trees so she will just blame you, also if she’s savvy enough to make an account you didn’t know about and you tell her you’ve found it then she’s likely to be more savvy about making any more secret accounts in the future.
I would put a limit on the internet for the next few days at least, maybe an hour or 2 an evening and only then when she is in the same room as you and as others have said educate on dangers of grooming, digital footprint etc

[PassMeAnotherCoffee]

Education is the way to go. I have boys but they were made very aware of the sad, sad story of Breck Bednar from the moment I heard it on the news. They were still in primary but they heard the news bulletins and I reminded them of the genuine danger they could put themselves in. (And thank you Breck's mother for your work educating young people and I'm so sorry for your loss).

I wasn't trying to terrify them but I told that it was like walking in front of a lorry. And they knew they'd get squished if they did that.

[ScreamingLadySutch]

Come down hard.

Talk to her about predators.

This media lawyer warns school children about the digital world, and wrote a book "Selfies, Sexts and Smartphones - a teenagers online Survival Guide"

www.thedigitallawco.com

[ScreamingLadySutch]

Emma Sadleir specialises in social media law and says cyberbullying, sexting and revenge pornography are the most common cases she deals with among youth.

[pictish]

I agree with Isadora - I don’t think an outright ban on the internet or even taking her phone is a great idea and I’m sure most advising it wouldn’t actually do this with their own dc. The internet is everything now, take it away from her and she’ll hate you...and have all the more resolve to defy you.

This needs a lot more subtlety and understanding from both of you...not the sledgehammer approach.

[pictish]

P.s totally agree that discussions should be full and frank though. Don’t hold back on your opinions...but also don’t punish her too severely.

[ittakes2]

I think you need to get from her first before you impose penalties on why she was motivated to post a bickini shot - did someone encourage her or was she just copying others? I would go the other way with this one - kill her with kindness and tell her you know she is too young to understand but this is very dangerous. Tell her true stories about children who have lost their lives after ignoring their parents social media rules. She expects you to punish her - knock her off her feet by doing the opposite but go hard in other ways ie make her do internet safety courses or whatever. My concern is she has the capacity to be sneaky - punish her and she might just get better at being sneaky. Insist on an open relationship.

[Melroses]

Teaching them to swim is not enough - you need to teach them about the rip tides, currents, flood flow, cold water under the surface etc etc.

Children think that adulthood is about doing all the things that parents do not let you do and are often in a hurry to do that, so you need to teach them the nasty bits first (sadly ) Some things they will only learn by experience but some things are best not experienced.

Def withdraw computing facilities for a set time and use that time to teach.

Also, find out why she did this, and look to providing an alternative distraction that does not involve internet. (Horses was a good one with mine - expensive but they seem to be all-consuming and learning control and interaction provided a much needed boost to self-confidence. Cheaper ways into it can be found.)

[ScreamingLadySutch]

'The long term harm is your reputation .... we need to start managing that reputation from a young age. I speak to corporates about managing the risks of employees getting it wrong on social media ...

I have felt for a long time that by giving children who are very young, smartphones, we are giving them a lot of rope to hang themselves, and by not educating them we are saying 'go ahead'. I really feel that we are failing children, because the errors that they make now at a very young age have the potential to impact them far down the line. ... I saw somebody who consulted me a long time ago about a social media error ... he studied law, did exceptionally well and he is simply unable to get a job because when you google him what comes up is that he wore a racist costume to a party at university. ..."

REALLY WORTH WATCHING THIS TALK

[Yesicancancan]

You need decent knowledge of how your internet provider’s parental controls work.
Then implement parental controls in her phone.
My internet for example blocks all social media.
I do not think taking phone for long is wise. Your dd needs educating about the potential dangers of what she has done. Check her phone regularly, my rule is that if anything is deleted I keep the phone/device for a week. It is unusable between certain hours because he would be using it all night, it’s very easy to set up.

[dickiedavisthunderthighs]

Without meaning to hijack the thread, I have a similar issue with DS but with Whatsapp. He's 13 next week and so far hasn't given us any cause for concern, but he's recently started deleting every single Whatsapp chat before going to bed.
We only monitor his phone every couple of weeks or so, and that's a condition of him having a smartphone, but he's now clearly making it impossible for us to check what he's doing. He doesn't have social media. From what I can tell there's no way of stopping him doing this but it's making me uncomfortable as he clearly has something to hide. Has anyone been through this and has any advice on how to handle it?

[Brefugee]

you'll probably need to get her to change the password so she can't use it elsewhere - do it with her and when it gets to the part where you have to enter a new password, you can enter that yourself. Then go into the account and delete the photos.
But you know she'll set up another secret one, right?

[Melroses]

It isn't just reputation. If there are repercussions from what they post on social media in real life, be that bullying at school or worse, then it shoots their self-worth to pieces and makes it harder to apply for those jobs in the first place. It is a hard world.

[Pinkyyy]

I can imagine it was awful for you to discover this OP. I think you'd be right to take the phone away, 12 is far too young, even without the bikini pictures.

[Jellybeansincognito]

I don’t think taking away her phone and giving her a phone that has no app access is dealing with the situation.

Firstly- why does she feel the need to validate herself by uploading bikini shots to herself?

Have an honest and open chat with her about privacy, confidence and self security/ self worth and what sort of attention bikini photos bring- pedophiles/ sexual predators.

You also need to teach her about staying safe online- don’t meet up with anyone alone, don’t give anyone your address or area you live in etc. Find stories online to back up your points to her.

And finally, take her out and pamper her whilst you’re having these serious chats, she will be less likely to ignore you in this scenario as it’s more a girly chat, not mum having a go at you.

Can you also speak to her school so they can run a talk?

[TheHeathenOfSuburbia]

Nuttybutnice, the issue I guess with parental controls is I'm dealing with a 12yo who already has Instagram, WhatsApp etc so that ship may have already sailed. Last tried setting up controls 6-odd years ago and they made the device so limited as to be virtually unusable.

She's pretty good about telling me anything silly she's done, on or offline, her main phone issue is talking to her mates on Whatsapp and X is best friends with Y but isn't talking to DD, and Z started a group chat and didn't add her, and blah blah... basic teenage crap, just now it's online.

[Jellybeansincognito]

dickiedavisthunderthighs You could look for spyware for his device?

[TheHeathenOfSuburbia]

I follow DD on Instagram but Tiktok has kind of escaped me, I'm pretty sure she's not on Snapchat but I'd need to recheck that.

dickiedavis you can replicate a whatsapp chat to the computer if you have access to the phone, google whatsapp web. Or just tell DS not to delete his chats on pain of losing phone?

[User3468793]

Instead of punishing her you should discuss the risks and benefits of social media. There’s no way to prevent children from accessing it and banning Instagram will only make her an “outcast” in the eyes of her friends. It’s obvious that she’s trying to copy established influencers and children that age crave attention and acknowledgement.

If done correctly, social media can be very creative and fulfilling. Try to encourage her to look into other genres (art, slime, toys, food, diy, pets, crafts, oddly satisfying, unboxing) that don’t involve showing herself on camera. “Repost” accounts are also very popular where she curates content by taking the most interesting things from other accounts. If properly credited, most people do not mind at all.

[NuttyOrNice]

dickiedavisthunderthighs
He's 13 next week and so far hasn't given us any cause for concern, but he's recently started deleting every single Whatsapp chat before going to bed
We only monitor his phone every couple of weeks or so, and that's a condition of him having a smartphone, but he's now clearly making it impossible for us to check what he's doing. He doesn't have social media. From what I can tell there's no way of stopping him doing this but it's making me uncomfortable as he clearly has something to hide

WhatsApp only allow people 16years and older to set up accounts in Europe so your son shouldn’t even have an account. (Also, I’m not sure what you mean when you say your son doesn’t have ‘social media’ when he has a Whattsapp account 😅)
You can easily stop him having access to Whattsapp by setting up parental controls but if you don’t want to do that you can get parental control apps that monitor exactly what your child is doing online. Including social media and internet use. I havent used them so I’m not sure how useful they are.
It’s totally up to you if you want to let your son carry on keeping his WhatsApp messages private from you but if you want to stop him you can.

[Jellybeansincognito]

Also- I don’t like this whole ‘your employer/ university could look and judge you on your social media content’

They’re not allowed to do that!
I know people do, but it’s not allowed.
One brand in particular have a process of scanning their passport photos in when being hired, to ensure that they’re attractive enough for the companies brand. I won’t say what shop this is but I was disgusted when I was told by the store manager. Imagine the use they get out of social media now before interviewing someone- checking them online to judge how attractive they are.
Awful practice!