How can I tell family(parents) we don't want to share pictures of our baby with them.

[1stpregnancywoes]

I know this may seem strange and some may disagree but it is our baby and we are very keen to make sure her privacy is paramount and she can't consent. Initially we shared images of our baby with family via WhatsApp. We told them no sharing online. One family member did not listen to this and shared the photo.
We now no longer even want to share images with family at all as people just can't be trusted.
My husband's parents have again asked to see pictures of her ( mind you they haven't even asked how she is in around 6 months (she is 6 months and 1 week old)

How can we word this? How can we tell people
We don't want to share any images of her online at all. And that when they come to our home that we do not consent to them taking pictures of her as we know they will show/share them.

Thank you in advance

My brothers ex gf done this to all the family (my bros side) one day, that we’re not allowed to see pics of the kids as she’s not putting them online as it’s dangerous 🙄 we live really far from them so was only way to be able to see the kids other than FaceTime and it caused a massive rift in the family but now that she’s no longer with my brother the kids are plastered all over social media 🤷🏻‍♀️ I will say we do ask how the kids are regularly and I send up bday and Xmas gifts I just think she didn’t like us (fair enough), just wondering if you don’t like your other half’s family and that’s why?

The paranoia on this thread is alarming and disproportionate to the actual risk associated with having an innocuous picture posted online on a proud grandparent's social media account that has very few followers.

This is a world away from the family influencers and vloggers that actively exploit their children by forming a whole brand around their children and seek to build up followings of millions through creating para social relationships with their audience.

There are literally millions, if not billions of photographs of random babies on the internet. What is the exact risk that you are worried about and how would you honestly assess the likelihood and impact of the risk?

The thing is, once they're in the family WhatsApp, you've lost control of what happens to that image.

The family have the photos, and can post them wherever they want. And by the sounds of OP, they have done. Against permission.

@1stpregnancywoes there are certain family members I know will just pass pictures onto their random bit of stuff (whom they change regularly), forward on to their friends, post on SM etc. I've seen them do it with their own grandchildren so they'll see no issues with my child's images being passed to people I don't know. So I don't put them in the family group. I send them to people who I can trust and those people have been told not to pass to other family members.

I'd just tell them the truth. "We asked you not to share photos and you ignored our wishes, so now we are unable to trust you with photos. You're welcome to visit and to ask for updates."

Tell me you haven't read the whole thread without telling me you haven't read the whole thread...

Wish some people would take time to educate themselves.

@1stpregnancywoes I’m really surprised by the amount of negative responses here. We were in the exact same situation.

My dad is a photographer and my parents used to share thousands of pictures of me on Facebook, some used to promote his business, and as someone who has an eating disorder I really struggled with that. So I want my daughter to have control over what she shares and setting those boundaries from birth is important. Otherwise, when do you set them? Once people have permission they won’t stop.

So we said no sharing online as we don’t want to create her digital footprint until she can decide that. Giving that explanation seemed to make them more understanding.

Then like you, her one set of grandparents never see her and only message once in a blue moon. So when they do ask, I share one picture where you can’t really see her face just to keep the peace and if they do share it, it doesn’t matter so much but I’d tell them to remove it. Although honestly I absolutely despise the idea of them showing off the picture when they have absolutely nothing to do with her otherwise. But for the sake of peace, one picture once or twice a year where you can’t see her will do! 😅

Luckily everyone has listened when I said don’t share photos online. But if they hadn’t, I would just print out a picture and send it to that person instead. It makes a point and gives them what they want without you being the ‘difficult’ one!

So many replies so I hope this is useful. Ignore all the negative responses, it’s your decision at the end of the day and I think it’s great that you’re setting healthy boundaries from the start. You’re a great mum and you’re doing what you believe to be right by your baby, keep doing it!!! You have to advocate for her or nobody will. 💕

🙄 we live really far from them so was only way to be able to see the kids other than FaceTime

It really isn't. There's e-mail, other messaging apps like Signal, Teams, Skype, screen sharing during video calls, printing photos and sending them in the post etc

I read the last post with the reasons and most of the posts that agree with this and I still think it's mad.
No one can have that much control and a chilled household is a much nicer place for bringing up children.

Are they an accessory for the grandparents to show off on social media though? I'd say the ones here treating the child like an accessory to be shown off are the grandparents.

Did you know that there were a group of female children in Portugal recently who's faces were taken off social media accounts and pasted into pornographic images and those distributed around their family friends and others who lived near them? Did you know that's a tactic used by paedophiles to get their kicks without actually having to abuse a child in real life to get the image? Would you want your child or grandchild being used in that way? Because when their image is online you've zero control where that goes or how it's used. I work in a field that deals with this and its much more common than people think. If it's more important for the grandparents to show the child off than to respect the parents wishes aimed at keeping them safe then it's absolutely the grandparents acting like they're an accessory.

I resent my dad for using my pictures to promote his business and my mum for sharing images I didn’t like that made me feel self conscious. Admittedly not baby pictures, but it’s far easier to set those boundaries now than try to revoke permission later on. Is there any need to post pictures online? No. Whose benefit is it for? Nobody’s. We live in a world obsessed with likes and comments and it’s refreshing to see someone put their child’s privacy first. Especially as a previous commenter mentioned, in a world of AI where people use other people’s imagery for their own grotesque fetishes. I’ve also had family and friends who have had their accounts hacked or fake profiles created using their images, and there are those poor souls who experience identity fraud. So it’s far from unreasonable to start putting boundaries in place that offer some level of protection early on. Especially when social media doesn’t even matter!

You’re so weird!! Sorry but get over yourselves

I'm amused by the outrage of people on this thread that the OP has different views from them about sharing online images of their child. They have taken it really personally and are trying to insult OP by calling her 'unhinged', 'weird', 'selfish'.

They are even more outraged that the OP has responded with good humour and has said that these comments don't upset her but that she hasn't changed her mind.

Some people on here are going to see this 'problem' or 'dilemma' as nuts, but im going to completely take your post at face value, no judgement here.

I would send your family members that have been asking for pics some beautiful framed pictures that they can put up in their homes.

I wouldn't bother trying to explain yourselves further, some people will just never understand your views (and they don't have to), or may even take offence when none is intended.

I think it probably makes people worry they should have thought twice before posting a lot of stuff. I think it’s a kind of shoot the messenger - especially as I think a lot of people actually invest quite a lot of time and interest in their SM image. If they stopped posting photos copiously it would massively cramp their style. So easier just to scoff I guess …

There is the option on Whatsapp to click on a symbol (it's number 1 within a circle on my phone) and it means the photo can only be viewed once. That stops people from sharing......

I think you're probably right. We've already started to see cases of people who's careers or personal lives have been badly affected by something they posted on SM as a teenager. The current generation of children are now going to have to put up with so much disjointed information about themselves "out there", shared and re-shared, accompanied by personal information and snippets of family business. Now imagine when all these kids are becoming MPs, eminent scientists, or high court judges, or just someone's boss.. ypu can see where this is going. I wouldn't want to have all that info about me in the public domain.

Why not prepare a little book of photos for them every so often. Either individual pictures or one from photo books or similar. It will mean they still have photos but it won’t be as easy to share then online. Become the photographer yourself so there are always photos of your parents with the baby. I think you are being unreasonable but this is one way forward until you become more comfortable with pictures being taken if your little one.
I have lots of photos of my grandchildren but I never share them online because I respect my SIL’s request not to do so.

But you’re saying that assuming that everyone’s family members are innocent and have private accounts. Keep in mind most scams happen online to old people. But here’s a real example and reason I keep my child’s photos offline:
My abusive dad once made a porn page of my dead mother’s private photos from their marriage. And he used to post photos of me on his FB saying things like my name, age and telling people to comment on my body. I’ve cut him out my life but my siblings haven’t. I wouldn’t put it past him to do something awful with my babies photos.

Weirdos

@MirandaJH I am so sorry that this happened to you and to your mum who has passed away, that is just horrific. I couldn't read and run past this comment, thank you for coming on and sharing this, I am fearful of what people are capable of and this is a really big example of why. I hope you are doing ok x

I'm sorry you experienced this. I can totally see why this experience would make you extremely wary about sharing images of your children. I don't mean to belittle your experience at all, but what happened to your family was unusual and involved some private pictures which are a completely different kettle of fish. I would never ever trust anybody with intimate pictures for this exact reason.

Sending a relative an innocuous baby picture is incredibly low risk. Without some pretty extreme doctoring then they're not really useful to perverts and the chances that someone would choose to do this on some random, non suggestive photo is vanishingly small. I'm not saying it doesn't happen but it's about keeping risk in proportion and not letting anxiety take hold. Be smart, be aware but also make sure that you act proportionately and fairly.

I'm impressed you managed to find a 'but' in that reply. Not only that but invoke the clause of irrational anxiety and assume that extreme cases are one offs or not representative of real life. In reality, if you take individual experiences with the internet out of the equation, the bottom line is that once you post anything through any platform, you no longer own it. You can no longer trace it. It is no longer yours. This poster doesn't say anything about the pictures being suggestive, just that the person involved promoted nefarious commenting.

Personally, I find it abhorrent that so many posters on this thread are falling back on 'all babies look the same', no one can do anything nefarious with baby pictures, 'no one cares about a baby picture'.

Firstly, these are all thinking about normal people that you probably know in your own small worlds rather than the bigger picture but secondly and most importantly, very few seem to realise that you lose all ownership rights of these pictures. They no longer belong to you. Who would want to opt into that on behalf of children? Our job is to keep them safe and give them as much autonomy as adults as possible, to dismiss this as disproportionate, irrational anxiety in fact shows a complete lack of understanding of how the world works today and what determines parental priorities.

The "so what" is that whilst you seem to be informed and fine with that happening, there are an awful lot of people who aren't but didn't know.

It's as simple as that.

If people saw a pop up when you posted your content online that said "this no longer belongs to you and AI scrapers/literally anyone who wants to use it can do what they like" the same way they have to consent to cookies, then they may think twice. Because they should think twice!

I have a neighbour who doesn't let her daughter to be photographed by anyone but her and her husband. So when my son had a birthday, she was not allowed to be on the pics. They had fun and they are good friends, but we don't have any pics of them together, as she doesn't let us. We all find it so weird.