Together for a Better Internet

TikTok is a social media platform for creating, sharing and discovering short videos. The app is very popular among young people as an outlet to express themselves through singing, dancing and comedy, and allows users to create videos and share them across a community. You must be 13 for the minimum age for TikTok however in Ireland the digital age of consent is 16 so anyone under that age must get their parents approval

Setting limits on TikTok

Here you can limit the amount of time your child spends each day on the site and also the type of content they have access to . You can also restrict who can comment on your teen’s videos, you can also manage who can send your teen direct messages, or you can turn off direct messaging completely

Here’s how to enable screen limits and filter content on your kid‘s phone: Go to your kid’s TikTok account within the app and tap the three dots at the top right of the user profile. Then select “Digital Wellbeing” next to the icon of an umbrella. From there, select the features you want to enable

BeReal is a popular photo-sharing app that lets you share one photo per day to show your followers what you are doing at that moment. It only allows one post per day.

It differs from other social media platforms by encouraging users to share unfiltered snapshots of their lives, and by only allowing one post per day.
Users get a notification saying “Time to BeReal”  once per day. In the app your child has a two-minute time limit in which to take a picture of what they are doing at that moment.
There are no editing options or filters, and the image features pictures that have been simultaneously taken by the back and front cameras. So followers see both what is in front of you when you take the picture, and your face.

Really important things to note

When posting a picture, the default option is to share it privately with ‘My friends only’ , however users can choose to change the setting to ‘Everyone (Discovery)’ .
Choosing Everyone, or Discovery, shares the picture publicly with everyone on the BeReal Discovery newsfeed. This means that all users on BeReal can see the post, interact with it, and have the option to add you as a friend.
The ‘My friends only’ option means that only people you are friends with can view and interact with your post.
Your location will be displayed on the BeReal map, unless this option is disabled before sharing your post. 

Snapchat is used to share photos, videos, and text. It’s free to download and send messages using it. It has become really popular especially with young people. There is one feature that makes Snapchat different from other forms of texting and photo sharing: the messages disappear from the recipient’s phone after a few seconds

It very easy to use just take a picture using your phone, select recipients from your contacts, decide how long you want the message to be visible for (up to 10 seconds), and click send. For the recipient, the process is very like getting a text message, simply tap to view. The message disappears from their phone once the time limit has expired, although the details of the sender and the time stamp remain. People can also screenshot the snap and save it ! You can add friends from your phone/device contact lists in addition you can now add friends who are nearby, so if users are hanging out in a group – it is now easier to connect and become friends.

Things to remember about Snapchat

• Protect your privacy . By default, anyone who knows your username or phone number can send you a message. However, you can set your Snapchat account to only accept messages from users on your “My Friends” list in the settings menu in the application. To do this, simply select “Who can send me snaps…”, then select “My Friends” instead of “Everyone.”
• Don’t allow messages from anyone that doesn’t follow them
• Don’t accept follows from people or companies you don’t know
• Snapchat allows users to share their location with their friends/contacts using the Geofilters function or Snap Map feature. This option can be disabled by ensuring your phone’s locations settings aren’t enabled, you can also turn off filters in the Snapchat settings

At its most basic, Instagram is a social networking app which allows its users to share pictures and videos with their friends. The app can be downloaded for free from the usual app stores. While its used mostly for picture sharing its real popularity comes from its picture-editing functionality with filters.

As always things to remember about Instagram

Like all aps there is a risk that the wrong people could use images on Instagram to harass or humiliate people
Young people may unknowingly share personal info or photos
It can have a negative effect on self esteem as young people may compare themselves to the highly edited and curated images and lives of others on Instagram leading to feelings of inadequacy
Young people may spend so much time on Instagram that they neglect offline relationships ands activities leading to feelings of isolation and loneliness

YouTube is a video sharing service where users can watch, like, share, comment and upload their own videos

Why do young people like it so much

YouTube is a free to use service and a can be a great place for teens to discover things they are interested in like. For many teenagers and younger , YouTube is used mostly for music videos, comedy shows, how to guides, recipes, hacks and more. They can also use the video-sharing service to follow their favourite vloggers subscribe to other YouTubers and celebrities they are interested in.
To set up a YouTube account users must be over 18 or 13+ with parental consent ( digital age of consent in Ireland is 16 though ) But you do not need to sign-in to access the website or to view videos so in reality they can see a lot of content that you might not deem appropriate. If you or your child do come across something inappropriate, you can flag the video with YouTube.

Something to be very aware of

The Safety mode in YouTube is a setting which allows users to bar mature content. It is an “opt-in” setting, which means that it won’t take effect unless you switch it on. The setting filters search results to remove videos that have been age-restricted, meaning that such content will not show up in searches, related videos, playlists, shows or movie sections.

When someone uploads a video to YouTube, by default the video is set to public . You can easily switch videos to private or unlisted (published on YouTube but cannot be found without a direct link to the video) this will reduce the risk of the negative or hurtful comments being left .

A lot of teens set up their own video channel and this is where they can experience negative comments and bullying particularly through the comments function (YouTube users can comment on videos). If your child has a YouTube channel/profile it might be a good idea to recommend they disable the comments function.

What is Twitter?
Twitter is a social media platform that allow users post short messages called tweets which are limited to 280 characters . Users can interact with tweets by liking and commenting and sharing . It is often used for sharing news ,updates and personal thoughts. It allows people to follow other users and in turn they can follow you. It also has a feature called hashtags which are keywords or phrases preceded by the # symbol, this makes it easier to discover tweets about a popular topic.

Parents should be aware that Twitter can contain content that is not appropriate for children including profanity , violence and sexually explicit material . They should also be aware that children may be exposed t cyberbullying and other forms of online harassment on twitter.

Additionally they may be at risk of sharing information or interacting with strangers on the platform . It is important to monitor their use of twitter and have open conversations about internet safety.

Twitter does have moderators and a reporting system in place to flag tweets that violate the rules but it is important to note that their efforts are not always able to keep up with the sheer volume of content that is posted online and it is possible that harmful or offensive content can slip through

Visual Supply Company (VSCO) is a photo and video editing app that allow uses to capture edit and share their photos and videos. Primarily used by photographers and online influencers to edit and enhance but has spread to mainstream.

Some important things to note is that profiles on VSCO are public so a user’s profile can be viewed by everyone and unlike many other apps you are not given the option to switch to a private profile.

It is restricted to over 13, in Ireland we know the Digital age of consent is 16 however an email address is all that is required to create an account so the age limit can be easily bypassed.

There are regular reminders to sign up for the premium version even though the free version is what most users avail of, it only has limited features so there may be a temptation to upgrade.

Pressure to present a perfect image which can lead to low self esteem and body image issue.

Kids can spend excessive amount of time on them which can negatively affect social life and studies.

You can block someone VSCO preventing them from sending a message or to follow you or to share your content, however it does not stop them from viewing your profile or your images.