When kids go online, they’re not just watching videos or playing games, they’re navigating virtual worlds where they can talk to real people and spend real money.
Consumer Reports offers advice and tips on setting parental controls to prevent unauthorized charges and protect kids online.
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Lynne Ramsbottom’s grandson loves to play on Roblox. Although the platform itself is free, he took his grandmother’s credit card and spent $2,000 on virtual clothing, accessories, and in-game upgrades.
“Instant panic! How am I going to pay for this? How am I going to fix this?” Ramsbottom said.
Stories like this are becoming more common as games make it increasingly easy for kids to spend money without realizing they’re making a purchase.
“What can be confusing for kids is that it doesn’t always look like they’re spending real money,” Nicohlas de Leon with Consumer Reports explained. “They’re buying in-game upgrades, or Roblox, or Gems, or coins, or any of that type of thing. That extra step can make it difficult to make the connection that they’re making actual real charges to their parents’ or grandparents’ accounts.”
So, what can parents and grandparents do? Consumer Reports’ experts say parental controls give adults more control over their child’s online experience.
“Games like Roblox do offer parental controls that can limit how much children can spend in a game,” said de Leon. “But generally speaking, parents do have to set those up on their own. And because purchases can happen through the game, the app store, a phone, a tablet, there can be more than one layer of protection that parents need to enable.”
Setting up parental controls only takes a few minutes.
On Apple devices, parents can use Family Sharing to set limits on apps, websites, downloads, and purchases.
For Android devices and Chromebooks, Google’s Family Link offers similar controls, while Microsoft Family Safety provides parental control tools for Windows computers and Xbox consoles.