Did you know strangers can now get directions to your child’s exact location on Snapchat?
Getting someone’s location on Snapchat is not new. Snapchat Map as a feature has been around for some time. If you dont have ‘Ghost Mode’ enabled on your snapchat, your location will be visible to others via the Snapchat map.
But Snapchat Map feature has now been updated.
By tapping on the person’s bit emoji icon on the map you can now get the EXACT ROUTE VIA GOOGLE MAPS OR APPLE MAPS to their location. Complete with how long it will take, on foot and by car.
As Snapchat is a very popular platform, particularly with children, this could put young people at risk. They may not fully realise (or care) about the privacy settings and how they work on the platform. This could place them at risk from strangers – who can find out where they live or hang out – and now it’s even easier for opportunists to plan – they’re even told how long it’ll take to show up there.
As a parent or carer, it’s more important than ever to have an awareness and understanding of the risks within social media apps and platforms and to start implementing practical protective solutions.
Staying up to date on how privacy and safety settings work is a great start to open up regular conversations. Start with sitting down together and exploring how to enable settings so that these are set to a level that both the young person and the parent or carer is comfortable with.
Here’s a solution for the latest update to Snapchat Maps:
Unlike some of the other apps Snapchat does not offer automatic location privacy. Snapmap is on by default.
Ghost mode allows users to remove all live location from the map.
To enable Ghost Mode – tap on the map, tap on the cog wheel at the top right and turn Ghost mode on.
Need help when it comes to online safety? Book a 1 to 1 practical parent or carers session with me today click on the image below to find out more
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