HAVE PHONE WILL TRAVEL

I travel a lot for work so I’m away from my family more than I’d like to be. It bothers me that I can’t be there all the time to protect them. I know that they’re relatively safe because we live in a good town, in a great neighborhood and in a fantastic school district, but trouble can happen to anyone and anywhere.

My wife is home full-time which makes me feel more at ease, but still … she can’t be everywhere with them. One of the places she definitely can’t be is in their digital lives. We have two kids and both play on digital devices. My daughter is 14 and she has an iPhone and my 9-year old boy has an iPad. He, for the most part, just basically plays Clash of Clans and Mine Craft. She, however, has a whole other life on her phone.

My daughter does everything from listening to music to watching Vine videos to socializing on Twitter and Snapchat to making her own films on iMovie, spyphone. She basically lives on her phone and shares everything. It takes a concerted effort on my and my wife’s part to get her off of it from time to time. It takes almost as much work to get my son off of his tablet as well—especially when he and all his friends get together to “play”. If you have sons on Mine Craft and Clash of Clans then you know what I mean.

Over use of their devices is one of our concerns, but there are plenty others. We’ve sat down and voiced our concerns with the kids. We’ve told them about not abusing their privilege of even owning an iPhone and iPad. We’ve also discussed proper etiquette in the digital world as well as the dangers. We talked to them about hackers, scammers, perverts and online bullies, android tracker. We want them to be very aware of what they are saying, sending and receiving when they are on their devices. They both seem to understand. But that’s just not enough for us. So here’s what we did.

My wife and I installed mobile monitoring apps on their iPhone and iPad and we told them we were doing it. My son was completely fine with it, but my daughter balked at first. Then we discussed why it was necessary and how we wouldn’t use it to pry into her growing teenage social life.

The “spy app” we chose is called SurePoint and we picked it because it got really good reviews and didn’t cost a fortune. With it, we can monitor from afar, what our kids are doing on their devices anytime. I use it when I’m traveling, because I can’t be there to talk to them at the end of the day, spy software. With SurePoint, I can see who they are texting and calling, what pictures they are sending and receiving, and how much time they are spending on their devices. It helps me make sure they are safe and also to enforce the rules of not over using the devices.

So far, the app works like a charm. I don’t abuse my spying powers, but do check up weekly to make sure nothing bad is going on. It’s sort of like poking my head into their bedrooms or watching them from the front door when they’re playing in the front yard or street. In the end, I just want to make sure they’re safe and I feel like this is helping.