Stay connnected with Hybrid Her by signing up for our newsletter!
Todd Morris, the CEO of BrickHouse Security, began his company by selling spy gear to police departments and other professional (brickhousesecurity.com). Today, a large part of his business comes from families. He provides solutions to parents who want to watch their nannies at work via hidden webcams, parents who want to record their kids’ Internet conversations and parents who want to monitor how far or fast their kids are driving. “I entered the consumer market by demand,” says Morris. “These devices are scaled down, less expensive, easier to use versions of the professional tools.” Morris, by the way, uses a nanny camera in his own home to watch his young child and sitter. His camera is disguised as an air freshener, and the nanny has no idea that she’s being recorded. Is it spying or is it being a good parent?
There’s not a parent who doesn’t wish they could be omnipresent, keeping their children from harm. Yet every parent confronts the question of balance: when is it over-the-top to monitor your kids and when do they deserve some privacy, trust and the chance to be independent?
Lost and Found
Some of the best selling items in the kids monitoring world are “electronic fences.” These rely on some sort of location-based tracking system that lets you pinpoint your child’s location, wherever they may be. With younger kids it’s fairly easy to make an argument for using trackers. They often wander in very public spaces. Kid trackers are the electronic equivalent of those harnesses that parents sometimes tie onto their kids in the shopping malls.
IonKids (get it? Eye on kids) works like a Geiger counter of sorts, only without the radiation. The parent holds a base unit and slaps a bracelet on the child. The bracelet emits a radio frequency so when the child leaves a specified range (say 500 feet) an alarm sounds on the base unit. The base unit can then be put into “find mode,” indicating your proximity to the child. The IonKids base unit can monitor up to four tamper-proof bracelets simultaneously—one for every kid in the family.
Households with young children and two working parents often rely on nanny cams consisting of inexpensive digital video recorders. Many of these cameras are wireless and can be hidden almost anywhere, from inside a plant to a stuffed animal. Some let you watch your kids at play via a website while others can send reports to your phone. Parents who use the cameras say there’s a tremendous peace of mind in being able to see what’s going on at home when they’re not around. Those who use it don’t have a problem spying on the nanny.
As kids get older, their world gets bigger. Monitoring often relies on cellphone technology. A company called Guardian Angel produces cell phones that come pre-installed with tracking software (guardianangeltech.com). When the child is out with their phone, the parent can log on to a website and see exactly where they are. A similar service is offered by My Mobil Watchdog (mymobilewatchdog.com). You’ll receive an immediate alert if your child receives any unapproved email, text messages or phone calls. It will even track their textmessage conversations. Kajeet makes a specially outfitted phone that lets you put a finite amount of money into it for the kids to use, sets time limits and who you can talk to and text on the phone, and locates your kids when they have their phone turned on (kajeet.com).
Can You Do It In a Car?
Some new technologies have been created to let you monitor the kids in the car as well. These devices can record where someone drove to, how long it took and the speed they were going. You’ll know unequivocally whether the kids went to their friend’s house to study, as they said, or whether they decided to travel to a neighboring town for a party. The CarChip logs up to 300 hours of driving trip details including time/date, distance traveled and speed (carchip.com). You can set up an alarm to notify kids should they go over the speed limit. Recently, Ford Motor Company announced that its new cars will now also have chips that monitor speed and location.
Technology makes it easier than ever to answer the question: it’s 10P.M., do you know where your children are?
Nervous enough yet? There’s no end to high-tech offerings that can prey on parental fears. There are cameras being installed in schools so that parents can watch what the class is doing. There are home drug-testing kits. The scariest one I’ve seen is a bulletproof backpack that kids can wear to school. So what’s a diligent parent to do? My personal preference would be to not have to rely on technology to monitor my kids. Call me old-fashioned, but I would like to believe that we can have a little more faith in our kids, in ourselves and in our communities to avoid the spygear scene.
That being said, we live in a complicated world. Two-earner households can’t spend as much time being around our kids as we’d like. Technology can help us feel closer, more involved and in control.
Robin Raskin has been at the forefront of technology, parenting and education for more than 30 years. The former editor of PC Magazine, and Family PC, Raskin writes and lectures about raising kids in a digital age. Her television appearances include The Today Show, CNN and Dateline. Her articles have appeared in Parents, Real Simple, and Family Fun.
Post new comment