Tracking your child may jeopardize their mental well-being, French privacy authority says

The Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés (CNIL), the French data protection authority, has warned parents who monitor their children with GPS trackers that allow them to track their location at any given time. This practice can harm a child’s development, their relationships with others, and their privacy.

Nowadays, people can buy all sorts of devices to track children’s locations, including Air Tags, GPS trackers, connected watches, and smartphone applications.

It may sound like a good idea to use these kinds of devices to monitor your child’s whereabouts, but there are numerous risks involved.

First of all, constantly following a child’s movements may have negative effects on their mental development and relationships. For starters, it may limit their autonomy and ability to assess risks, preventing them from learning how to protect themselves.

Secondly, real-time tracking affects the relationship of trust and dialogue a child should maintain with their parents. For example, it can push a child to self-censorship because they don’t feel comfortable discussing their whereabouts.

Furthermore, real-time tracking can be very intrusive for a child. Therefore, parents should avoid this at all times. In addition, it can even be dangerous, especially when malicious people gain access to a child’s real-time location.

Lastly, the CNIL suggests that using tracking devices carries the risk of accustoming minors to being under constant surveillance, not making them aware of their private life.

“Tracking devices have real consequences on the child’s private life. It’s therefore necessary to evaluate the functionalities offered with regard to needs and risks,” the CNIL said in a blog post on Monday.

The privacy regulator advises parents to disable real-time location sharing. A phone without an internet connection or a smartwatch that works without a smartphone is often sufficient to stay in touch with a child.

Last week, the CNIL warned people not to carelessly share their location in real-time with others. By doing this, people share personal and sensitive information that might be interesting for data brokers and advertisers.

Additionally, it may lead to gradually accepting daily surveillance.

“It may seem reassuring to follow the position of a loved one. But this practice can quickly become intrusive, even burdensome for the person concerned. This implicit pressure sometimes makes it difficult to regain control over your location data,” the privacy supervisor suggested.