“Family Center” helps children and parents to establish a dialogue

Discord is a popular application for communication by interests, especially among video game lovers. Not all parents know who their children are friends with in the virtual space and how safe it is. In order to increase the transparency of communication in Discord, the company Launches a new tool called Family Center. However, it will be possible to use the service only if the teenager gives his voluntary consent.

If the teenager agrees, their parent or guardian will be able to see:

• recently added friends;
• the communities in which the child is a member;
• names and avatars of people with whom he exchanges messages or calls in private and group chats.

All information will be displayed on a special application panel, which will show statistics for the last seven days. In addition, parents will be able to receive weekly email updates. However, in any case, it will be impossible to peep or eavesdrop on what exactly the young user writes and says.

In order to connect to the account of their child, the parent will have to ask him for a special QR code. The code must then be scanned through the Discord app and the teen must approve the connection. The essence of this multi-step process is for the parent and child to discuss everything frankly in advance before the child grants access to the data.

“Just like parents know who their teens friends are and what clubs they are in at school, Family Center helps them keep up with what their kids are doing on Discord,” the company wrote on its blog. “Our goal with Family Center is to promote productive dialogue about safe online habits and create mutually beneficial ways to share online experiences.”

Discord isn’t the only company encouraging parents and their kids to have a conversation through these programs. Last year, Epic Games, developer of Fortnite, introduced new type of subscription for players under 13 years old. It restricts certain features such as text and voice chat until parent or guardian consent is obtained.