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Does your child have a smartphone or a smartwatch?

Strichmännchen mit Handy
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Children grow up with tablets, smartphones or smartwatches as a matter of course because their parents have such devices. As soon as you as parents consider it acceptable, you will certainly provide your children with their own devices. We have compiled a few recommendations for you on what you should pay attention to in this context.

  • It is important that you perform the regular manufacturer updates so that no vulnerabilities can be exploited on your children’s devices.
  • Always keep an overview of which programs and apps are used by your children.
  • Regularly check which permissions and accesses the used programs and apps have, here especially location determination, camera, microphone or photo gallery.

With the so-called wearables, e.g. fitness trackers or smartwatches, you should additionally check which permissions and accesses the programs and apps have on your children’s health data (e.g. heart rate, temperature). Fitness trackers monitor the body and store health data. Depending on the device and settings, health data are not only stored, but also shared. This affects not only health data, but also often the location of the wearer (accurate to the meter). 

Be open-minded towards the Internet and your children’s activities. However, provide your children with age-appropriate information, advice or recommendations. Connect the gift of the smartwatch with information about what it can do, from location determination to sound recording. Set up the smartwatch together with the child and agree together which functions should be used. Prior to the purchase, you should gather information about the terms and conditions, terms of use and privacy policy, because, depending on the device, wearables can collect a great number of data and thus collect a lot of information from your children.

Of course, the above instructions apply simultaneously to smart home devices and tablets.