Snap expands parental monitoring features amid legal pressure

Snap is introducing new parental controls to Family Center, Snapchat’s suite of parental monitoring tools. The updates allow parents and guardians to monitor teen screen time and friend connections on the platform. Specifically, parents can now see the average amount of time their teen spent on Snapchat each day over the previous week. They can also see how this time breaks down across different parts of the app, including chatting, snapping, creating with the camera, using Snap Map, or watching content on Spotlight and Stories. Additionally, while Family Center already allowed parents to see a full list of their teen’s friends, they can now see how their teen likely knows a newly added friend. For example, parents will be able to see whether they have mutual friends, are saved as a contact, or belong to shared communities. According to the company, these new features provide details to help parents start productive conversations if they see an unfamiliar contact. “These trust signals make it easier for parents to understand new connections and have greater confidence that their teen is chatting with someone they know in real life,” Snap stated.

The rollout of these features follows a recent settlement of a lawsuit filed by a 19-year-old plaintiff, K.G.M., regarding “social media addiction and mental health issues.” The lawsuit also named other platforms, including Meta, YouTube, and TikTok, though no settlements have been reached with those companies. The update comes as social media companies face broader scrutiny over their “failure to protect minors on their apps.” Snap originally launched Family Center in 2022 in response to this regulatory pressure. Since its launch, Snap has built out the tool with additional features, including the ability to see who teens have recently interacted with, set time restrictions, and block access to the app’s My AI chatbot.

While Snap has settled this specific case, it remains a defendant in other social media addiction cases. According to documents disclosed in the ongoing cases, Snap employees raised concerns about “risks to teens’ mental health” as far back as nine years ago. The company has stated that these internal examples were taken out of context and cherry-picked.

Why it matters

Snap’s latest feature update highlights the ongoing tension between social media platforms and regulators, as companies attempt to balance user engagement with increasing pressure to mitigate potential harms to younger users.