Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iPhone to track kids?
- Thread starter MBPJohn
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
You should download and install "Find My Friends." It's made by Apple and is perfect for your purposes. You can be alerted when they leave certain places like home or school. It's free.
^
Unless your kid is under 8 years old and has no common sense, this is a huge invasion of privacy. Parents or not.
Don't you trust your kids enough to just text them and ask where they are?
I agree, it's brilliant and I use it all the time.
The only downside is that it's very easy to disable. So if someone doesn't want to be located they can just block anyone from finding them.
If you're planning in hiding this, they'll eventually figure it out and disable it or cause a big argument over it. No kid wants to be tracked, even if they don't go anywhere but school and home.
Hardly. Unless you having something to hide, what does it matter if your friends/parents know where you are?
My daughter Is 13 and I use it all the time, she's knows its on there and it's no problem, not only is it for me to make sure she is where she says she is it also could save her life if anything bad ever did happen, I also pay her phone bill for an ip5 that I gave her so she doesn't gave a choice lol
Because it's an invasion of privacy and trust. If my parents text me and ask where I am, I'd love to tell them. If they installed a tracking app on my phone without asking me, I will delete it, disable location services, and never allow that.
Side note: How come everyone who argues with me about privacy issues on here is from the UK?
My wife got into a car accident this summer totaling her Jetta. I received a phone call from my wife's phone by a witness who had saw the accident and went to help. The witness said my wife was in an accident on RT 313 and the phone disconnected. Rt 313 is about 6-8 miles long.
Anyways I quickly got my keys and opened the App Find My Friends and saw where she was! I knew exactly where she was and got there before the ambulance took her.
We also use it to see when each other leave work to have dinner ready, etc. This app is very important to me along with iMessage. For these reasons I cannot foresee ever owning a phone other than an iPhone.
Anyways I quickly got my keys and opened the App Find My Friends and saw where she was! I knew exactly where she was and got there before the ambulance took her.
We also use it to see when each other leave work to have dinner ready, etc. This app is very important to me along with iMessage. For these reasons I cannot foresee ever owning a phone other than an iPhone.
First, nobody said anything about doing it behind their backs or not telling them.
Second, disabling it in my household would then cause for a very simple solution... you wouldn't be allowed to leave the house.
I never said anything about installing it without them knowing!
It's not an invasion of privacy if they know. And if I had kids I'd like the ability to know where they were without calling, texting & bugging them. Basically I'd buy them the phone with the understanding that I know where they are. I'd say that's a pretty fair deal.
And maybe people in the UK don't get so paranoid and upset as they do in wherever you come from.
I'm not from the UK and I disagree.
And let me say if I installed a tracking app and they deleted it i wouldn't have to worry where they were. They'd be at home....until the app went back on. (Oh, they wouldn't have the phone either until they complied)
This is coming from a 44 year old man with 3 kids.
I use it on both my kids phones. They are aware it's on there and they've been instructed to never disable it.
I'm not a snoopy parent or a fanatical crazy. I enjoy having peace of mind knowing when they safely arrive a particular location. We live in a major US city with lots of weirdos.
If they feel its an invasion of privacy, they can buy their own phones and vehicles. However, I've raised them to be honest, trustworthy, and dependable. To be honest, they enjoy us having it on all our phones. They can see where my wife and I are at all times just like we can them.
Find My Friends is simply awesome.
I'm not a snoopy parent or a fanatical crazy. I enjoy having peace of mind knowing when they safely arrive a particular location. We live in a major US city with lots of weirdos.
If they feel its an invasion of privacy, they can buy their own phones and vehicles. However, I've raised them to be honest, trustworthy, and dependable. To be honest, they enjoy us having it on all our phones. They can see where my wife and I are at all times just like we can them.
Find My Friends is simply awesome.
Am I the only who sees the irony in this whole discussion considering how many adults are uneasy at the prospect of the government tracking them through their phone?
It's not on all the time as in draining battery power.
If you try to locate an iDevuce, it sends a ping to the registered device just like an iMessage. The receiving device grabs its GPS coordinated and sends it to the requesting phone.
Now, if you put a geofence on the device (notify when leaving/arriving), it does drain the battery on the receiving device because it constantly checks its current GPS coordinated against the geofence.
With all that said, battery rain is not an issue, and the app does not even need to be running.
If you try to locate an iDevuce, it sends a ping to the registered device just like an iMessage. The receiving device grabs its GPS coordinated and sends it to the requesting phone.
Now, if you put a geofence on the device (notify when leaving/arriving), it does drain the battery on the receiving device because it constantly checks its current GPS coordinated against the geofence.
With all that said, battery rain is not an issue, and the app does not even need to be running.
use find my iphone instead of find my friends.
----------
i don't think they are the same people...
----------
i don't think they are the same people...
Huge difference between government (elected officials) tracking me versus my wife and children.
Even then, I don't give a crap if the government knows where I'm at. However, I believe it to be unconstitutional without a SPECIFIC warrant.
Find My iPhone will require the password for the apple id associated with iCloud on the device to be turned off.
Find my Friends allows geofences.
Find my Friends allows geofences.
Then the teenager can buy their own phone...enter into a contract with the carriers...and pay the monthly bills. OR...go without a phone and have even worse restrictions. When I grew up, we didn't have cell phones. Kids today have more freedoms because they are in constant contact with parents. That extra freedom comes with some constraints. As parents, nothing on this earth is more important than our children's safety and well being. If technology helps in this capacity then children will just need to suffer through it.
Last thought. Just because I know my kid is at a friends house doesn't mean they aren't breaking rules, etc. trust is still required. Tracking just provides us with a means to know they made it safely to their destination.
Are you kidding? Kids are like pets except you don't kill them when they get too sick
They are too inexperienced to be trusted 100%
You don't have to convince me. I'm just pointing out how most teens would probably see it.