• by Colin Kirkland , January 11, 2024

Snapchat has introduced new parental controls that will allow parents to keep closer tabs on their teens’ use of the social media platform.

Now parents can restrict their teens from interacting with the app’s AI chatbot, “My AI,” while also gaining more seamless access to Family Center, where they can view their teens’ privacy settings and adjust parental controls.

Launched in 2022, My AI received widespread criticism with regard to the feature’s intrusiveness in users’ inboxes, unexpected location tracking and explicit conversation topics taking place between the chatbot and minors regarding drug use and sex.

The new safeguards, Snapchat says, include “protections against inappropriate or harmful responses, temporary usage restrictions if Snapchatters repeatedly misuse the service, and age-awareness.”

Now parents will be able to see their teens' safety and privacy settings as well, including the teen’s ability to share their Story with friends or groups of select users and whether or not they are sharing their location with users via the Snap Map.

More importantly, parents are now able to view their teens' contact list to see who is allowed to contact their teen on the app.

Snapchat has been subject to various lawsuits regarding adults grooming minors and facilitating drug deals with teens involving the dangerous drug fentanyl in the app's messaging feature.

At the end of the month, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel will testify before the Senate about instituting child safety on the app. He will be among representatives from other leading social media platforms like X, TikTok, Meta, and Discord.

In addition, Snap and Meta have been requested by the European Commission about how they are attempting to protect young users on their apps. 

Earlier this week Meta updated its parental control policies as well, announcing new protective tools focused on the types of content that teens see on Instagram and Facebook, including similar restrictions and control settings.

As part of Snap's new parental controls, parents will also gain easier access to Snapchat's Family Center, which the company says “reflects the dynamics of real-world relationships between parents and teens, where parents have insight into who their teens are spending time with, while still respecting the privacy of their personal communications.”

Teens make up a sizable portion of Snapchat’s core audience.

A recent study that examined the social media use of almost 1,500 13- to-17-year-olds shows that 60% of teens said they use image-sharing social platform.