Phone tracking apps - anyone used them?

[pasanda]

My daughter has just been given an iPhone for her 12th birthday. Having had my ds (14) go through self harm culminating in a suicide attempt last year, and viewing the contents of his phone during this horrible time, I am vaguely thinking about using a tracking type thing for my dd.

My ds was embroiled in a world of angst and misery via his phone. He frequently viewed sites talking about self harm, suicide, support groups etc and seemed to get deeper and deeper into this. I wish I had known

I have just had a look at 'Teensafe' which allows you to track the phone, see all texts, KIK messages, whatsapp messages etc etc.

Has anyone used this type of thing? Is it a shit idea that will invade her privacy too much do you think? I wouldn't tell her I was going to do it and would just monitor it as life went along...

She knows that I want access to her passcode which she is fine with (at the moment!) but that means I have to check her phone if I want to when she hasn't got it, which is only really at bedtime and I want to go to sleep then! If I had the monitoring device on my phone, I could access it whenever I wanted to.

She is very innocent right now, but I know from experience that this can and probably will change quite soon!

Thoughts anyone?

Don't do it without her knowing. It's a massive invasion of privacy and if you find something out from it, how are you going to sort it out without confessions you've been spying on her? I know someone who is doing this with their DD and they have already seen something unsavoury, but are powerless to do anything about it. Get the passwords with consent and look through the phone once a week.so, you go to bed a bit later, but it's worth it to keep the trust there.

I agree with JustDanceAddict. I really understand your fears, given what you have been through with your DS, but my decision would be to explain those fears to your daughter, educate her about the 'risks/dangers' of social media use, internet use etc. and educate her about how to use the phone and its apps/internet access positively to bring her enjoyment and happiness. You could explain that, while it is new and she is finding her way, you would feel more comfortable having the passcode and being able to have a look through, and see how she feels about that.

With both of my sons, when we first gave them phones we had the passcodes and I did check messages occasionally after they'd gone to bed. But not very often! Once I spoke with my son about using inappropriate language on messages (mild swearing). A couple of years on and I haven't even thought to ask what their passcodes are, and I wouldn't dream of snooping on their private messages. Teenagers need freedom from us as part of growing up, I think.

I think most parents of teens would agree that you are going to have to establish trust. If she isn't already, soon she will be using apps like Snapchat and others we don't even know about, which are almost impossible to spy on anyway, so the main issue here is educating her to stay safe and happy with social media/online, and then trusting her to do so.

Good luck with her, and I hope that your son is ok now - that must have been such a hellish time for you all.