Handing Your Child a Tablet: Hidden Risks & Parent Liability Explained
It’s a common scene: you hand your tablet to your child to keep them busy at the airport, in the car, or while waiting for dinner. A seemingly harmless cartoon or game—what could possibly go wrong?
But what most parents don’t realize is that in that moment, they may be assuming full legal and financial responsibility for whatever happens next. Whether it’s an accidental in-app purchase, a privacy breach, or exposure to age-inappropriate content, the device may be in your child’s hands—but the consequences come back to you. Here’s what you need to know before handing over your tech this summer.
1. In-App Purchases: “They Didn’t Know What They Were Doing” Doesn’t Always Work 💸
Many apps, particularly games and entertainment platforms designed to be engaging, make it incredibly easy—and nearly impossible to distinguish for a child—between simple play and making a real-money purchase.
Accidental Spending: A child innocently tapping colorful buttons can accidentally approve $50 in game currency, subscription upgrades, or virtual items in mere seconds.
Varying Refund Policies: While some platforms do have refund policies for minors' accidental purchases, those policies vary widely by platform and the nature of the purchase. In many cases, if the purchase was made through a device tied to your adult account with saved payment information, the purchase may be considered legally valid.
Parental Liability: Some courts have ruled that if parental controls were not adequately enabled or bypassed due to lack of oversight, the company is not liable for the charges—the parent is. This highlights the importance of proactive settings management.
2. Data Privacy and Children’s Rights: Parents on the Hook for Compliance 🔒
When kids access games, educational content, or even simple apps, those applications may quietly collect a range of sensitive data.
Data Collection: This can include precise location data, unique voice samples (especially from interactive apps), detailed usage behavior (what they tap, how long they play), and device identifiers.
COPPA Compliance: Under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in the U.S., collecting such personal data from children under 13 without verifiable parental consent is illegal. Similar regulations exist globally.
Unintended Consent: The critical trap: if your child uses an app logged into your adult account, the platform may argue it was your consent (as the account holder) that allowed the data collection—even if unintended for your child’s use. This means you could be held accountable for breaching terms of service or inadvertently exposing a child’s data without realizing it, facing potential fines or legal action.
3. Inappropriate Content Exposure: Reputational and Legal Risks 🔞
While streaming services and platforms often offer child profiles with strict content filtering, these are not always enabled—especially on shared family tablets or convenient travel devices.
Accidental Exposure: If a child stumbles across violent, sexually explicit, or otherwise age-inappropriate content and a third party raises a concern (e.g., at school after a child recounts what they saw, in a public setting, or during a group trip where another adult notices), parents may face significant reputational damage.
Legal Questions: Depending on the context and location (jurisdiction), such exposure can even lead to legal questions or citations. For example, streaming adult-rated content on speaker volume in a public family setting (like a park or airport lounge) could result in complaints or even official citations under public indecency or child protection ordinances in certain areas.
4. Shared Screens, Shared Risk: The Account Holder’s Responsibility 📧
You might think your child is just quietly watching cartoons in the backseat—but kids are inherently curious and adept at tapping. The touch interface is intuitive, and boundaries between apps are often just a tap away.
Unintentional Actions: It’s not uncommon for children to accidentally:
Tap open banking or email apps (especially if open in the background).
Delete important documents or photos from a shared gallery.
Send garbled voice messages to unintended contacts (including work colleagues).
Accidentally livestream to social media platforms without knowing what they're doing.
Consequences: All of this can happen in minutes, and if it results in data leaks, contract breaches, or policy violations (especially on a work-linked device), your role as the primary account holder makes you responsible—even if you weren’t directly involved in the action.
What Responsible Use Actually Looks Like: Proactive Protection
To effectively protect yourself—and more importantly, your child—from these unseen digital pitfalls, take these simple but critical steps before handing over a device:
Set Up Separate Child Profiles: Always establish separate child profiles on tablets (if the OS supports it, like Android or Amazon Fire OS) with strict content and purchase filters enabled.
Disable Voice Purchases & Require Passcodes: Go into settings for all apps and the device itself to disable voice purchases and require biometric authentication (fingerprint/Face ID) or a passcode for all purchases and downloads.
Regularly Clear History: Routinely clear Browse history and app usage history on shared devices to manage privacy and content exposure.
Use Offline Content: Opt for offline games and downloaded media when in public or travel settings. This reduces reliance on potentially insecure public Wi-Fi and limits opportunities for unwanted online interactions or content discovery.
Review App Privacy Settings: Dive deep into each app’s privacy settings. Limit unnecessary permissions, especially for camera, microphone, and location access, particularly for apps used by children.
Avoid Work Devices: Crucially, avoid handing over work devices or any device directly linked to business systems (e.g., corporate email, sensitive client portals). The risks of data exposure or policy violation are too high.
Summary Reflection: Intent vs. Device Action
Giving a child your tablet might buy you a few minutes of peace—but it also opens the door to unseen risks that can last far longer than the duration of a cartoon. In the digital world, intent doesn’t always protect you. It’s what the device does—and what it records or enables—that truly matters in the eyes of the law and digital security.
This summer, as tech and parenting intertwine more than ever, it’s time to ask: Are we just protecting our kids from tech… or are we also protecting our tech (and ourselves) from the unforeseen actions of the kids?
