iPhone and internet trust (For the 14 Yr old)

OK. I bought Chelsea an iPhone. She knows that I keep track of what she's up to on her desktop, but with the iPhone, Apple has probably not thought of the fact that there are parents like me that will buy these for their kids, thus they do not have parental control portals on the web to monitor browing activity!

At present, Chelsea knows I trust her and she know's the Do's and Don'ts of the internet under my roof....BUT, I still want to know what she's up to with her unlimited web access on the iPhone! Do I: 1) Not worry about it or : 2) Do suprise inspections of her iPhone to look at the cookies, etc. to keep her on her toes? I don't want to beome a monitoring Nazi, but in parallel, I have my duties as a parent to safeguard my kid!

What would you do?

 

Im sorry to say but unless you are an internet guru , she visits whatever she wants and you will never know about it.

You might catch her the first time you do a surprise inspection of her Iphone but after that she'll know that she'll have to delete the history after each suspicious website visit.

 

After the iPhone 2.0 update is released (June 9th) parental controls will be an option.

 

Yeah, iPhone 2.0 is your solution. Might I ask: what are you trying to censor?

 

I know she is only 14, and still a 5 year old in your eyes, but I agree, what are you trying to keep her from? She has to grow up sometime and 14 is a good place to start. No way you will be able to keep her from talking to friends at school and other places.

Bottom line she will either learn about what you fear through education and talking to her about it, or through EXPERIENCE. Given the two, I would vote education and talking to her.

 

If you trying to go to anything "suspicious" on an iPhone, its going to a while to load, and its a rather small screen. I wouldn't be to worried.

 

+1 on the trust, in lieu of monitoring...

This is the one that made the "hair" comment?

I treat my 16 year old (Amanda) as I do the 24 year old (Renee) who then advises me on how to deal with Lady Valeria (49 and counting)...life works out for ya, sometimes.......

 

I would not worry about it. I have an iPhone. Even though you do have full inter-web access, it's not as fast and fun as a desktop. It's not like she's going to be sitting there chatting it up on Yahoo! Personals with internet predators. It's not that easy. IPhone is good for browsing, looking up phone numbers, address, and anything else that would not take long.

I would not worry about her iPhone internet use at all. Texting would be a larger worry. But I would not be digging through her phone being a Communist Phone Nazi. I would just talk to her about whatever the rules are. If a red flag pops up one day, she would be punished or lose her phone if she breaks the rules.

I understand she's 14 and you want to watch out for her. But in 4 years she's going to be 18 and moving out of the house to go to college. Are you going to follow her to college and spy on her there? You have to draw a line somewhere. Plus spying on her shows you don't trust her. You need to learn to trust her, just like you need to learn to trust a wife or girlfriend. Do you think the relationship would last if you were constantly spying on your wife or girlfriend? It won't last with your daughter either.

 

Your kids are going to cross the line at some point and time. The question is how far. Better to trust them and give them some slack now than be the authoritarian parent that has their kid explode when they get to college. Saw it happen with a lot of my friends. Let her know your rules, trust her, if she behaves in a way to violate it, pull in the reins.

 

I don't have my iPhone yet (I can't wait) but if it functions anything like an iPod it should update the computer that it syncs with. Meaning that it should keep logs of all the conversations, websites visited, etc. on the desktop that she links the iPhone to. So technically you don't have to go snooping through her phone if you just check the desktop.

And I have to agree with keeping a watchful eye, even though I don't have any kids I know that from my own childhood that my parents were right a lot more of the time than I was. Parents keeping tabs on their kids aren't hampering their development, they are just trying to push them in the right direction. So I say check away, fear of you checking things out might be enough of a deterrent to keep her walking the straight and narrow when she could potentially stray.

 

Peter,

I wouldn't worry about it too much. If you had a son, I'd worry. A daughter? Not so much. Time will tell when more apps develop.

 

........ / Adon / others....Thanks. Not that I want to know EVERYTHING she is doing, but I guess I am being the average parent, that's all.

 

No matter how good your teenager is, she will be hiding something from you. Fact. Especially a girl going through that stage of life where popularity is the most important thing in the world and they are overwhelmed by insecurities and peer pressures. No matter how determined you are as a parent to stay abreast of all the secrets in your child's life, they will continue to shield things from you. It's the nature of teenagers to behave this way, and the internet is a cesspool ripe with ways to do this. Personally, I think an iPhone is excessive for a teenager. It's 10% phone and 90% feel-good cool accessory. If a kid really needs a phone, there's nothing wrong with something more entry-level.

 

What not to do is to pick up her phone and read it when she puts it down and isn't watching it. (possibly a rare thing to happen) My ex girlfriends dad used to do that, and it drove her mad. It created alot of distrust between the two of them, and she hated the idea of him reading her messages. BTW, she was 18 at the time too.
I dunnow what the solution is. Perhaps trust her?

 

I think the fact that you are showing concern enough to post on here for advice from others shows that you are an above average parent. You care and want to do what is in the best interest of the child. Most parents would do what they want to do and not take her side into account.

The only mistake my mother ever made was she controlled and sheltered me so much that I eventually just started lying about everything to her and I never have felt like I could be completely open to her. That's the reality of it. My dad who is only in my life a few times a week on the phone and a few times a year was a terrible parent, but one thing I will always give him credit for is I could always be open and honest with him and he knows more about who I am as a person and my life than my mother who was the much more nurturing parent and a much better example.

I agree with the above poster, and that is that control and ingraining fear into your children will drive them to just get more creative and better at lying and deceiving you because teenagers will find ways to do what they want.

I hate to say this too, but as computer savvy as you may be I am pretty sure that your daughter also knows the ins and outs of protecting her privacy from your eyes. As a teen growing up, I knew how to delete my history, cache, and cookies before I knew almost anything else!

Good luck. Parenting seems like such a tough balance. Too controlling and too protective and your children begin to lie and the trust melts, not controlling and protective enough and they lose touch with their strong moral backbone. Tough.

 

Why not just get her a phone with just talk and texting? Or just Talk?

Does a 14 year old need an Iphone with internet access?

 

What are you worried about?

 

porn on the iphone is amazingly clear....

 

I think your concern is more about myspace and things like that I'd imagine.

My parents didn't and still don't know much about computers. Do you know how much porn I looked at when I was 15?


















And I use to find porn sites and deleted videos my dad would get in emails in his temporary files at work. HAHAHAH!

 

+10.

I don't understand why a kid needs an I-Phone. That simply feeds into the whole problem that we are talking about here - peer pressure and the need to be "cool".