Stranger Danger: Should you be posting your kids’ photos on social media?
updated the 14 November 2016 à 11:28The less you share, the less risk you pose to your family.
The digital age has definitely taken over our lives. From capturing pictures of our loved ones on film cameras to switching to your mobile phones and uploading them with ease on your social media accounts. These days, photographs and videos of various occasions are being uploaded by everyone into well-organised albums online for all to see. Although it may seem like you have taken the necessary precautions in protecting your social media accounts, hacking of profiles still occur. What’s worse is that the harmless friend request you’ve accepted from that random stranger may turn out to be a bug or a sexual predator. What then?
Sexual Predators
With social media sites like Facebook offering various privacy settings that can be altered to your liking, there’s no way to guarantee that your photos will not be seen by people you didn’t intend to share them with – it can also be from well-meaning friends or relatives who republish your photos, without taking care to add any privacy precautions. The risk of stalkers targeting your children may be small but it cannot be completely neglected. All this is dangerous as predators may be able to identify recognisable landmarks or information in your photos – the same goes for checking in to places. Games and apps encourage you to share your location or to link your social media profiles to start playing. Unbeknownst to you, you are giving these apps access to your profile, enabling them to retrieve personal data. All this makes it easy for someone to stalk or do harm to your family, if they wanted to.
Bad Example
While it may seem harmless to do so right now, you are actually teaching your kids that it is okay to reveal too much information to strangers. With more kids owning their own smartphones and other electronic devices, it makes them an easy target. It is also important that your kids understand the dangers of uploading the wrong kinds of images to prevent unwanted attention.
Cyber Bullying
While it may seem hilarious to post an embarrassing photo of your kids on your social media accounts, it can expose your kids to bullying. Do remember that the internet is not all that safe and if embarrassing photos of your kid is leaked, people can share them on various forums online as a joke, creating an unsafe environment for your kid. This, in turn, could cause emotional trauma for your little one.
In conclusion, we are not here to force you to stop uploading photos of your kids, but do try to do it less often. However, if uploading photos of your kids are the main reason for you to be on your social media accounts, do it without attracting too much attention. Remember to edit out any landmarks that could be in the photos, never upload any photographs of your kids in their uniform to avoid predators from lurking around the schoolyard, and try to limit yourself from posting their names as well.
Read more:
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