YouTube sounds pretty harmless, right?
Until when your child can’t go in the dark because they watched a creepy Halloween episode while you were washing the dishes or watching your favourite show on your laptop.
The dulcet noises of daily life will suddenly be audible to them: the dryer tumbling, children giggling, water gushing through the tap. They will then hear it almost immediately after that. They can even be first blind to it. But it won’t be long before it’s too obvious to ignore.
Shark baby, The sound “doo doo doo doo”
Parents may get shivers watching it, but there is no doubt how popular PINKFONG’s “Baby Shark” video has become with children worldwide. That popular YouTube video that has received close to three billion views to this date has become a hit with kids, inspiring toys, media parodies, and yes, even more videos. Additionally, even though it’s a generally humorous illustration of
Following claims that YouTube was being used by predators to find videos of underage girls, prominent corporations like AT&T, Nestle, and Epic Games have halted their advertising on the website just this year. With just a few clicks, consumers may occasionally be directed by Google’s recommendation algorithm to videos with offensive and maybe predatory comments.
While there are solutions available to help make life safer, there isn’t a single solution because new issues crop up almost as quickly as new fixes. So, how do we help them?
1.Help children self-monitor
Along with supervision, it’s important to teach even young children the fundamentals of media use, habits, goals, causes, and effects, as well as other concepts to support self-monitoring. There are eleven more approaches to making YouTube safer for all kids in addition to these large-scale ideas.
Using The YouTube Kids App
As was already established, there have been some growing pains with the YouTube Kids app since its 2015 release.
The app’s offensive content has been mentioned by parents on numerous occasions, and it is still a problem. It’s challenging to imagine a situation in which YouTube can ensure that every piece of information viewable within the app is judged absolutely appropriate given that an algorithm determines what is appropriate content to see. The only option for young children to view YouTube content is through YouTube Kids because the main YouTube website is only intended for users 13 and older.
You can set up YouTube Kids in a number of different ways to make it even safer for your child and significantly lower the possibility that they will see any objectionable content.
2. Disable Search
You can prevent children from exploring YouTube Kids’ content on their own by turning off the search. By doing the following, you can disable search on YouTube Kids:
The Lock is located in the bottom-right corner of the screen. Click it.
If you haven’t set a passcode, enter it now or respond to the math question.
On the Settings gear, click.
When prompted, choose your child (Note: You must repeat this process for each child you want to set this for under your account) and enter your Google password.
Opt out of “Allow searching”
3.Adjust the content level
In the YouTube Kids app, there are a number of choices for the content that can be shown to each child, ranging from videos for younger learners to those ready for a less limiting experience.
You may choose “Approved content only” in order to give users the safest experience possible. This will guarantee that your youngster can only watch videos that you have given the go-ahead to. The YouTube Kids team and their partners have also built collections that are accessible through the app. These libraries include videos whose appropriateness has been determined. To alter the content your kid can access:
The Lock can be accessed by clicking on it in the screen’s lower right corner.
Input your passphrase.
Select your child (Note: This process has to be done for each child you wish to set this for under your account) and enter your Google password when prompted.
Under “Content Level,” select “Approved Content” only.
4. Pause Watch History
Allowing YouTube Kids to suggest videos to your child based on the ones they’ve already watched is another setting you may change in the programme. Putting this on hold will prevent the app from recommending videos based on newly viewed videos or search phrases (if you still have that feature enabled). Watch history can be paused by:
The Lock can be accessed by clicking on it in the screen’s lower right corner.
If a passcode hasn’t been set, enter it here or respond to the mathematical inquiry.
the Settings gear by clicking it.
If prompted, choose your child (Note: You must repeat this process for each child under your account you wish to set this for) and enter your Google password.
By choosing “Pause watch history,”
5.Add a custom passcode
You should make sure that any modifications you make to YouTube Kids’ settings can’t be undone by a young child who wants greater independence, even after you’ve enabled those changes. Even though the lock that must be clicked to access the settings screen says “Parents Just,” the default configuration only needs a youngster to correctly answer an arithmetic question to access the settings panel.
This should be done before granting your child access to prevent them from creating their own passcode and locking you out of the Settings. A four-digit passcode must be enabled in order to:
The Lock is located in the bottom-right corner of the screen. Click it.
If you haven’t set a passcode, enter it now or respond to the math question.
On the Settings gear, click.
Note: You must complete this process for each child you want to set this up for under your account. After selecting your child, enter your Google password when requested.
Choosing “Set custom passcode”
Choose a 4-digit number and enter it. The new code needed to access the Settings menu will be this one.