Daughter's first phone... Life 360???

[DLow]

Daughter is getting her first phone at 12. Who is using Life 360? It seems to be ok, but we'd like more monitoring of her texts/calls, etc. What is everyone using for phone monitoring? We are all on Apple phones, and it will stay that way. So we are looking for IOS systems. Thanks for any input.

 

[RodnJen]

Daughter is getting her first phone at 12. Who is using Life 360? It seems to be ok, but we'd like more monitoring of her texts/calls, etc. What is everyone using for phone monitoring? We are all on Apple phones, and it will stay that way. So we are looking for IOS systems. Thanks for any input.

My wife uses it for the kids, 14 and 11, and really likes it. We got them phones when the 14 yo started riding the bus to Jr high. We don’t monitor text or calls, haven’t felt the need to.

 

[Chris Lapoint]

My daughter has had a phone since 11 now almost 14, she's a good kid but obviously it's our job as parents to ensure that continues.
We came up with a couple house rules,
1. We can look at it anytime we want - it's a privilege.
2. She breaks/Loses it, she buys a replacement.
3. Phone is to stay in common area (Kitchen for us) after 9pm and it charges on the counter over night. (This allows some separation for sleep and for us to check it if we feel the need in the mornings before shes up)
4. She sets the time limits for each of the social media type apps for certain hours (iPhone feature)
5. DON'T BREAK OUR TRUST, or your F***ed.

Lol, this has worked so far.

 

[DLow]

My daughter has had a phone since 11 now almost 14, she's a good kid but obviously it's our job as parents to ensure that continues.
We came up with a couple house rules,
1. We can look at it anytime we want - it's a privilege.
2. She breaks/Loses it, she buys a replacement.
3. Phone is to stay in common area (Kitchen for us) after 9pm and it charges on the counter over night. (This allows some separation for sleep and for us to check it if we feel the need in the mornings before shes up)
4. She sets the time limits for each of the social media type apps for certain hours (iPhone feature)
5. DON'T BREAK OUR TRUST, or your F***ed.

Lol, this has worked so far.

Agreed on all of the above. We have already set the same basic ground rules on other devices.

 

[ka0tyk]

If she’s on an iPhone you can enable iCloud and receive her texts calls etc. only problem is kids don’t really text anymore. They Snapchat. Kik TikTok Instagram etc. which you will have zero visibility into unless you have her account info.

 

[Riverbound]

We have it.

It’s actually pretty convenient and now the whole family uses it. I really like the driving alerts having teenage drivers. My kids know that if they disable it they lose all phone and car privileges.


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[Spot]

iPhone and learn how to use all the restrictions. You can get an iPhone to do most anything you want as a parent and then lock the phone so your child can’t change anything.


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[Dan Lorenze]

I'm on life 360 with my whole family. Works great, I would definitely do it.

 

[DLow]

iPhone and learn how to use all the restrictions. You can get an iPhone to do most anything you want as a parent and then lock the phone so your child can’t change anything.


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Yes. We have set up our own user password on it to lock down a lot of stuff and restrict things like time of use, websites, (RDP) etc. Starting an interesting journey.

If she’s on an iPhone you can enable iCloud and receive her texts calls etc. only problem is kids don’t really text anymore. They Snapchat. Kik TikTok Instagram etc. which you will have zero visibility into unless you have her account info.

Going the icloud route. I do all of my backups on my macbook, in an attempt to keep a lot of stuff off the cloud and more retrievable, but we are going to make some changes now.

I realize find my iphone works also, but the life 360 seems to be a little more user friendly, quicker to access, and has some other add ons.
Thank you all for the input. Any other ideas? I'm always looking.

 

[ka0tyk]

Going the icloud route. I do all of my backups on my macbook, in an attempt to keep a lot of stuff off the cloud and more retrievable, but we are going to make some changes now.

I only use icloud for settings, location, and synchronization. As far as pictures/data its all pulled off our phones/ipads/computers onto a server at home (mac pro)... synced off to aws S3 buckets via rclone, and then transitioned off to glacier for long term storage. The mac pro also runs Plex to index all our photos and allow us to view them anywhere. I prefer Plex because it simply indexes the content and doesnt suck them up into some proprietary format, database,website, etc... They're all available on a network drive at home and through plex via apps/web and in the event the house burns down we can restore from amazon.

Thats how I deal with the 8+ devices in our household.

 

[Jefftowz]

Yes on Life 360, All 4 of us have it, They know where I am and I know where they are. My 16 old set us up when he got his licence. I give him 50 mph on streets and 73 mph on the freeway. He's a great kid and always checks in and keeps in touch.

 

[DLow]

I only use icloud for settings, location, and synchronization. As far as pictures/data its all pulled off our phones/ipads/computers onto a server at home (mac pro)... synced off to aws S3 buckets via rclone, and then transitioned off to glacier for long term storage. The mac pro also runs Plex to index all our photos and allow us to view them anywhere. I prefer Plex because it simply indexes the content and doesnt suck them up into some proprietary format, database,website, etc... They're all available on a network drive at home and through plex via apps/web and in the event the house burns down we can restore from amazon.

Thats how I deal with the 8+ devices in our household.

Thank you. I'm going to look into doing this, or at least a better storage system than what we are using. Wife and I do regular backups on a couple 2T drives, but a third storage would be better. I still have that I Mac I got from you a couple years ago and this will make better use of it. Yeah, we are dealing with 12 devices now, since she just got a phone, and all 3 are getting I-Pads tomorrow. I did cheap older refurbs, but they work for what the kids need since they are still newer OS's.

Thanks everyone for the thumbs up on 360. Will be good to get used to it for a while... a few short years and she will be driving.

 

[DWC]

Our kids are no different than most of us were. The exception being non-stop opportunities to F up. They’re getting non-stop texts, DM’s, snap chat etc. I’d never ASSUME my kids weren’t capable of getting off the rails. Use the technology available to keep an eye on them. Even Great kids make bad decisions when hormones and peer pressure kick in. It’ll help keep the good kids honest.

PS. The sneaky ones have already figured out ways around everything we can see.

 

[Uncle Dave]

I inherited teen age guys that were straight A perfect attendance students, anti social, didnt talk much, and shared a bed room.
I never had to worry about that shit.

UD

 

[copterzach]

My wife and I use Life360. Mainly because I spend a lot of time flying on the border and way out in the country. She feels better.


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[TPC]

Believe it or not TASER at one time made a family set of cell phones.
Moms phone had monitor features of the kids phones and the kids phones had pre set restricted numbers they could converse with. All the kids phone activities lit up on moms phone screen.

Maybe there are apps out there that would allow the same.

We always had phones on the kids.
PITA invaded one child’s daycare at my ex’s work and it was real ugly and violent and you bet you want to know that ASAP.

LEOs hesitated to deal with it so angry parents did.

24” water main pop’d At the daughters school flooding it. Cell phones were strictly banned but then Father Michael got on the PA and asked for the kids with cell phones to let other students call home with them.

You never know.
Kids are smarter than us. Put a cell phone on them soon as they can roll with it.

You’ll still think you did the right thing when you’re older and the kids handcuff you to a chair in the basement, feed you dog food and cash your checks.

 

[TPC]

Our kids are no different than most of us were. The exception being non-stop opportunities to F up. They’re getting non-stop texts, DM’s, snap chat etc. I’d never ASSUME my kids weren’t capable of getting off the rails. Use the technology available to keep an eye on them. Even Great kids make bad decisions when hormones and peer pressure kick in. It’ll help keep the good kids honest.

PS. The sneaky ones have already figured out ways around everything we can see.

How true that is.
Straight AP honors classes the teachers still warn parents the kids lie about homework.

Girls brains are social engines, boys are crash test dummies.
Girls are way better at sneaking things under the radar than the boys.

I’m still discovering shenanigans that got through the checkpoints years ago.

 

[Gelcoater]

We had 360 a few years ago when the kid was younger.
The app had a few features that were handy.
It showed any registered child molesters on the map, where they live and in some cases a pic of the dirtbag.
It showed a dot on the map for recently reported crimes, click the dot and info about the crime showed up.