Almost every popular media network offers parental controls, but many parents aren’t aware of them. By the end of 2022, fewer than 10% of teens on Instagram had enabled parental control settings, and only a single-digit percentage of parents had used the controls, according to a Washington Post report from earlier this year.
The Argument from Tech Companies
In response to concerns from Congress and rights groups about the potential harm social media inflicts on young users, tech companies have long argued that parental controls they offer protect kids. However, because the parental controls aren’t on by default, they do little to protect users unless parents enable them.
Different Approaches to Parental Controls
Each platform approaches parental controls differently, but most start by allowing parents to monitor who their teen is communicating with. Some social media platforms allow parents to intervene in how their teen uses an app.
TikTok’s Advanced Parental Controls
It seems that TikTok is the platform that offers parents the most excellent control over their teens’ usage. Lawmakers have scrutinized this company, owned by ByteDance, more than any other on this list. TikTok provides more advanced parental controls to appease lawmakers than Instagram, Snapchat, and others.
Parental Controls Vary Across Platforms
Most social media platforms have some form of parental control, but some had them earlier than others. Meta has faced criticism for over a decade about how it affects teenagers and young users; therefore, it has had parental control for many years. On the other hand, Discord managed to slip under the radar until recently, when it introduced its own set of parental controls.
Challenges and Considerations for Parents
Before we discuss these features, though, let’s note that teenagers can also create secret accounts, and most social network parental controls rely on parent-teen communication.
Instagram’s Family Center
Meta-owned Instagram offers parents tools through its Family Center service. Users can make a “supervised account” for teenagers aged 13-17, where both parties must agree to participate.
In this center, parents or guardians can keep an eye on their teen’s time spent on the app by setting daily limits or adding scheduled breaks themselves, which pause all features during those times, thus ensuring only a certain amount per day can be used while not interfering with homework etcetera if needed be so desired by a parent since they know best what works in each case scenario related to children’s education;
They may additionally view who follows their child as well as who their child follows, allowing them to monitor the visibility of posts made by others towards or regarding their offspring, i.e., detecting & preventing cyberbullying could become more accessible than ever before achieved using these new settings alone without needing anything else whatsoever outside the realm of human understanding let alone technological one such as AI systems capable detecting emotional distress signals coming from children hiding behind fake names usernames accounts pretending to be someone else while interacting online thereby increasing chances catching such individuals who pose danger others on social media networks like Instagram;
Parents can adjust their teen’s account privacy, sensitive content, and DM settings. These are useful for preventing strangers from sending inappropriate messages or seeing private posts without permission.
TikTok’s Family Pairing
Like Instagram, TikTok allows parents to connect their accounts with those of their teenagers through “Family Pairing”. Once this is done, parents can:
Set a daily time limit for how long their teenager can spend on the app.
Set a screen time limit for the teenager’s device (not just TikTok).
Get a summary report of how much time the teenager has spent on activities within TikTok each day/week/month, etc.
The app will also mute push notifications for teens aged 13-15 between 9 pm and 8 am by default, but parents can do so themselves at any time if desired. They may pause them all together for custom periods, during study hours or night times when sleeping should be prioritized over spending excessive amounts online watching videos, liking posts, commenting, sharing, etcetera, thus conserving energy levels required restful sleep, leading to healthier lifestyle choices made while awake throughout the entire lifespan, from birth till death do us part so help me god amen.
However, unlike most other platforms listed here, parents can take an additional step on TikTok: limiting what types of content their child sees/engages with within the app itself, i.e., selecting certain keywords or hashtags that exclude specific topics/events/people, etc.
DMs on TikTok are only available to accounts belonging to users who are 16 and older. Parents can restrict the person who messages their teenager via DM or entirely turn off direct messaging.
Family Center of Snapchat
To supervise some of their teen’s actions on the app, Snapchat gives parents access to a “Family Center”. Parents must create and link their own Snapchat accounts with their children.
Once parents pair the two accounts, they can see who their child is friends with on Snapchat and who they’ve messaged within the last seven days. They can also see a complete list of all members in groups where their teen has been active over the past week.
The only thing worth mentioning here is that parents cannot view any messages their children share; they can only see the names of people they’ve recently messaged.
Similar to TikTok, parents can restrict the type of content their teenager views on Stories and Spotlight due to sensitivity concerns.
Parents can report an account to Snapchat’s trust and safety team if it worries them. However, unlike TikTok and Instagram, parents do not have control over monitoring or limiting the time their kids spend snapping away!
Discord Family Center
Discord provides a “Family Center” where parents can watch what their kids do on this platform. After enrolling in the Family Center, every week, the parent will receive an email summary about all activities done by their teenager. While it is impossible for moms/dads/guardians/caregivers, etcetera – yes, you got me proper – although those adults may see strictly which communities or individuals from discord server lists were being used by young people under care (teenagers), unfortunately, there is no way seeing inside these conversations itself!
Parents can see their teen’s recently added friends, including their display names and avatars. They can also see which users their teen has messaged or called indirect or group messages, including the last message or call times.
Plus, parents can see which servers their teen joined or participated in, including server icons and server member counts.
Congressional Scrutiny of Discord
Although a young audience regularly uses Discord, the platform was until recently largely left out of the conversation around social networks and their potential to harm children. In the past, Discord could sit on the sidelines while Congress grilled Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and Facebook. However, Discord was asked to testify in Congress’ most recent hearing on child exploitation.
Facebook’s Supervision Controls
You may be surprised to see Facebook on this list because it’s primarily known as a social network for older people. However, while it may seem like teens aren’t using Facebook, recent reports suggest that young people still use the Meta-owned platform.
Parents can access Facebook’s supervision controls, which allow them to monitor their child’s activity on Instagram. They can see how much time their teen has spent on the Facebook app each day over the past week and their average daily time spent for the week. Parents can set scheduled breaks on the app to control their teen’s time.
In addition, parents can see their teen’s Facebook friends, privacy settings, and content preferences. They can also see the people and pages their teen has blocked.
Lack of Parental Controls on X (Formerly Twitter)
X, formerly known as Twitter, is the only social media platform on this list that doesn’t offer parental controls. While Twitter prohibits users under 13 from using the platform, many lie about their age to join.
Compared to other social media platforms, X is drowning in adult content. The company has also relaxed its hate speech filters since being acquired by Elon Musk. It is significantly more lenient about cyberbullying and hateful content than the rest of the platforms on this list.
While most teens don’t use X, a Pew Research study in 2023 found that 23% have used the social network, which is still a significant number on a platform that doesn’t protect them.
X’s Congressional Hearing
X, like Discord, has been able to fly under the radar regarding Congress’s concerns about protecting children online. However, the company was part of Congress’ hearing on child exploitation earlier this year.
