Facebook Messenger is one of the biggest messaging platforms on the planet, and the deep-link to Facebook obviously helps that popularity. Messenger kids is rolling out to 70 new countries with the aim of helping ease the feeling of isolation during the lockdown.
Thankfully, they have added supervision features for parents and carers to prevent random strangers chatting to kids. If your child is that bit older, you can also give them the chance to do this independently with parental oversight.
Parents have told us they want to be able to give their kids more independence in managing their contact list while still maintaining parental supervision.
Previously, it was up to parents to invite and approve every contact for their child. Now with Supervised Friending, parents can choose to allow their kids to also accept, reject, add or remove contacts while maintaining the ability to override any new contact approvals from the Parent Dashboard.
The Messenger Kids app has been around for some time in limited markets, now expanding to new shores including Australia. There are obvious concerns from parents about the increased time and presence online children may have as a result. It is worth noting that both Android and iOS platforms have the capacity for parents to limit not just screen time on a daily basis, but also the time that individual apps are used.
It’s a very clever time to expand the footprint, using the social distancing to bring kids closer together online. Messenger Kids is another step towards teaching kids online safety and independence while maintaining the safety of parental supervision.
What concerns would you have in allowing your kids engagement through an online chat platform?
