To read my daughter's WhatsApp messages

[JoelyJoe]

So. This is a genuine question, and I'm prepared for strong opinions either way, but I would really like to know what people think.
My daughter has just turned 13, she is in year 8 at school and has had a mobile phone since year 6. When she got the phone I told her the deal was that I would read her WhatsApps from time to time.
My reasons are to protect her / her friends, and to ensure that there is not bullying or situations / content that I think are inappropriate at her age. Social Media did not exist when I was young, and while I know that it can't be put back in the box, I think think there are inherent dangers... as many people do.
As I said, I have always been upfront with her that I will sometimes look at her messages, I don't do it very often, and obviously at some point in the near future (not sure exactly when though!!) I will stop doing it.
Any thoughts? Am I invading her privacy or is this a necessity to protect our young people... And for those of you who also do / did the same, at what age did you stop??

Part of the deal in this house, as are time limits and phones downstairs overnight. I won't apologise for parenting my child. She is fine with it. I don't check it that often ( and she has usually told me about everything in there anyway) but it's a good safety net, and she doesn't have a problem with it.

And definitely no Snapchat or social media

My dd is 12 and in Yr 8 and this is also a condition of her having a phone.

I also have parental controls on it, limiting what she can view and what apps she can have, time limits etc.
I am protecting her

I never checked my children's phones. But my youngest, who has (at the time undiagnosed and the diagnosis was not supported by school) ADHD, was put on a beta blocker for migraine aged 12. This had the unintended affect of increasing impulsivity and we had a year of really daft behaviour - drinking on the school bus on the way to school was a highlight. One day she decided to crush & snort her Propranolol in the school toilet, filmed by a friend. The friend's stepdad then found the video whilst checking the phone and took it to the police who rocked up at school and took the rest of the crushed tablets - still in Dd's pocket - for testing as it was suspected she was involved in county lines. Nothing came of the police thing, but we had to have a social worker for about 9 months. The behaviour was resolved when she got on the right medication (Equasym XL for the ADHD).
I'm not sure what the moral of the story is but they all stopped being friends with the girl whose dad checked her phone soon after. I think they suspected the girl had actually snitched.
DD is in a really good engineering apprenticeship with a well-known automotive manufacturer now, earning 30k at age 18 and smashing all her assessments, btw. Teenagers make mistakes and hopefully learn from them.

It’s far more likely the other girl wanted to get away from the ‘daft’ behaviour and made different friends.

I’m glad your dd is now sorted out and found well, well done to her but a lot don’t.

I think the moral of this story is to check your children's phones. I'm glad she's doing well now.

Hi.

My daughter was given a phone very early on too. She's now 16 😵‍💫.

I never went through her phone, however, I did tell her "that if I suspected anything inappropriate or unsuitable for her age I would take it to the police to search" this kept her in line, and safe as she knew it is what I would do.

But everyone is different. If you have discussed the YOUR T&C's of her having a phone then that's how it goes. Until she can put food on the table and contribute financially she has minimal to say. Follow your gut. A mother knows her own child and you will do what's right for both of you.

Good luck and dint feel bad your mum.

All the best 👍🏼

I'm not sure what the moral of the story is but they all stopped being friends with the girl whose dad checked her phone soon after. I think they suspected the girl had actually snitched.

If my daughter witnessed another girl - a 12 yo -snorting a white powdery substance in the toilets, I’d sincerely hope that she’d snitch.

I check very occasionally, mine are 11 and 13. They know I'm doing it, so no invasion of privacy. I haven't ever found anything worrying, but we do periodically get stuff from school about particular WhatsApp groups being associated with bullying, so that tends to prompt a conversation and a quick check.

I used to check but stopped around 13. If I am concerned something may be happening they know I will ask for phone to check. I used to tell her if anything she was concerned about to pass her phone to me and walk off if she did not want to talk it over. She was great at doing this so I dropped the periodic checking. I also made a point of saying my phone was open like there's and they could check mine. They still go through mine and laugh at how boring my messages are.

Ask yourself this. Is she trustworthy, honest and would tell you if there was an issue. Is she aware of all the dangers. Schools will have covered this from year 2 upwards. If behaviour changes then check. But if shes happy and not secretive...don't panic. You know your own daughter. So imo it's your call. Hope this gives you food for thought. I'm not going to judge as parenting is tough enough already these days.

And this is why there's all this bullying and awful teens around. They are children, children! It's not a gross invasion doing your job as a parent. And when that 13yo is being bullied? Then that's when you will be running around trying to get it sorted. No one in our circle of friends, let's such free reign over things like this.

13 is the age when they get more involved in all the emotional stuff at school and with friends, girls can be really bitchy. There’s a lot of parents in denial about the level of grooming and sex related convos that kids have at any age so I’d be doing random checks for sure.

We need to look out for our kids and protect them from the stuff they don’t see as dangerous - nude pics are seen as ‘normal’, social media bullying is ‘normal’- but leads to suicide and self harming

Keep being a hands on parent OP! You’re paying for the phone and it’s your house so your rules

No access no phone is my policy. Keep your kid safe and check their phone. It opens healthy conversations about all the modern day dangers of online bullying porn grooming etc etc

I find this discussion really interesting, particularly the vehemence with which some people are lambasting others for checking kids’ messages.

I would bet a big sum of money that these are the same people who would be self-righteously furious if anything untoward happened to their teen, or there was any sexually inappropriate behaviour anywhere in their lives etc etc.

Either kids are kids, in which case I think it’s absolutely fine to check their messages until they’re 16+, or they’re not kids in which case there can be no complaints over other stuff.

My kids know that their messages are liable to be read by me. I wouldn’t do it furtively, I do it openly not just for their safety but to remind them that they’re not adults yet. I’m not saying that those who don’t do this are wrong, but if you think your 13 year old is still a child for other reasons why not for this one?

There are so many ways for children to hide communication (eg social media apps disguised as calculators), it's very difficult indeed to monitor social media

I think better to focus on teaching them skills to keep themselves safe and build a trusting relationship where they come to you for support, rather than trying to keep tabs on them

@NeedToChangeName totally agree. I think a lot of these parents saying how they check their teen’s phone regularly (or the woman who checks it every night, YIKES!) are kidding themselves that their teens are OK with it and not just deleting stuff they don’t want seen.

I think there is nothing wrong with investigating further if something seems off, like asking to see messages in a WhatsApp group while they are there to check no bullying is happening, or asking about new people they’re messaging to make sure it’s safe, is fine - but routinely going through their private conversations is not. Most 16 year olds are having sex for the first time and experimenting with everything that goes on around that. As long as they understand safety they should be free to discuss this sort of stuff without mum reading it (ew!).

The awful examples the teacher shared previously, I’m sorry but if a girl is sending around videos like that to the whole school then there are bigger issues in her family than her mum not reading her phone, which need to be addressed.

No child will ever be 100% honest with their parents, you cannot know 100% of what goes on. Please do not snoop.

I find this really odd reasoning. Parents who check their kids’ phones aren’t checking so that they know ‘100% of what goes on’!

The deleting things view ... funnily some of the stuff I've at DDs messaging isn't stuff she has thought needed deleting which just reinforces the fact there may be conversations you need to have when they "don't see an issue"

Teens need to learn to keep private conversations private properly. Anything shared over text/whatsapp even snapchat is not sufficiently private. Because it leaves a written/picture trace in cyberspace that they have no control over once it’s sent.
So yeah, your 14-16 year old has their first potentially sexual relationship and wants privacy. Bit young but ok, fine. But it’s much safer for them to be experimenting without leaving traces in cyberspace. If your kid has sex for the first time and then their partner turns round and dumps them and starts spreading rumours they are shit at sex etc etc normal nasty teen drama, that’s one thing. If that happens but there’s nudes or videos of them that then get circulated around the school it’s a whole new circle of hell.
So the old nasty bullying of ´Stacey’s a slag. Britney told Ashley who told Ricky who told me that she gave Mike a blow job behind the bike sheds and showed him her tits’ has become ´Stacey’s a slag. Everyone’s seen that video of her with Mike and the snapchat of her tits. It’s all over tiktok’ (Names all made up obviously). Keeping phones well out of the sexual aspects of teens’ first relationships is a good thing.

And if you’re sitting there thinking -Well my kid’s not Stacey or Mike so it’s fine. No it’s not. You also have a problem if your kid is Britney or Ashley or Ricky or just Jane in the whole class what’s app group because now there’s pornographic image of a minor being downloaded and uploaded - which is the legal definition of ´making an image’ - by them or on the groups they are part of.
There are other reasons too outside of the hellscape of teens swapping nudes. Like the pp who’s kid was discussing pooling pocket money to try drugs and alcohol and getting friends to buy in. Trying drugs or alcohol at 13 is a bad idea. Discussing dealing drugs on your school what’s app profile is idiotic.
The internet is not private. Having mum or dad check your phone over as a teen helps to reinforce that knowledge.

I always find it amusing on these threads that there is an assumption by many that if you check your child's phone you don't bother building the relationship where they can talk to you, the possibility of things being deleted doesn't occur to you and you're stupid/naive enough to think the occasional check means you don't have to worry about anything at all ever.

Really, the people who care about invasions of privacy of a child against the well known dangers of the internet are idiots. Let them be groomed then. It may not be nice to check phones but it’s not as important as your precious child’s safety. I worked in a residential children’s home and we had to take their phones at night and thoroughly check everything we could find. I don’t think parents should go that far, but there’s a compromise to be had.

Dame agreement here with 11yo ds
I only check it couple times a week usually but he knows I can ask for it anytime for his own safety and wellbeing and its a Condition of him having it.
Not sure when I'll stop but possibly around 13 assuming he's proven he can be sensible

I always told my kids if I checked their phones and message threads didn't make sense, ie messages had been deleted, then the phone goes. It was in the day before a lot of the social media apps now - BB messenger was the main thing then! I actually didn't check them very often because I didn't feel I needed to but they knew there was always the chance.