, pinpoints the user’s exact position and those in their circle whenever the app is turned on. Some don’t even mind their parents keeping tabs on their movements. “When I think about it, it makes me feel safe, because I know that Mum or Dad knows where I am,” says Lola Pethybridge, a 17-year-old student from south London. “Or even my brother” – who is two years younger – “if it came down to him having to figure out where I was. It’s just that safety net where you can say, ‘I need help.
The subject of location tracking is a more contentious issue with other families. Alicia Hardy, a solicitor from Petersfield in Hampshire, encouraged her two children, Ben and Louise, to use Find My Friends after hearing about it from her sister who lives in the US. Ben, who was 17 at the time, lasted for about a month. “At that point in my life, I wasn’t necessarily that happy about Mum knowing where I was all the time,” says Ben, who is now 23.
By many objective measures, young people face fewer dangers than they did a generation ago, but it probably doesn’t feel like that to their parents. Livingstone has found in her research that daughters are especially likely to be tracked, with concerns about sexual assault and, in recent times, reports of drink-spiking. Many of the apps lean into these worst-case scenarios.
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