As my kids grow up, I’ve tried to consider the types of technologies that I can offer to them to improve their privacy, and more importantly, their mental health. I notice though that many adolescents using social media, messaging, and video as a way to interact with their friends, and so I want to find tech that enables that interaction without bringing all the ills and privacy concerns of social media.
I’m reading through The Anxious Generation, which highlights the sudden spike in rates of depression and self-harm in Gen Z. The book claims much of the cause comes from social media’s substitution away from natural local social interactions with peer groups of the same age and slightly older ones to learn how to be human. Rather, those peer groups are replaced by adult influencers who model being a successful human as hyper-individualist, materialist, and often pushing their beliefs one way or the other at a very impressionable time in their brain and behavior development.
I see some new tech alternatives like Gabb and TinCan that are trying to control for the brain development issues were starting to see with social media by providing a watch or phone with limited capabilities based on periods of development.
This all sounds good of course until you consider the information they get on your kid in order to facilitate all these features. It starts to almost feel KOSA-esque where we overcorrect on some notion of safety for privacy. I don’t want a spy device for my kid, but I do want a way for them to feel some level of normalcy when all their peers get smartphones and I’m the jerk giving them a locked down flipphone watch.
Anyways, does anyone have any experience or opinions on Gabb? Would you get it for your kid? Why or why not? Any open source self hosted alternatives?
Nothing about this tells me this is a privacy or a security forward device that will keep any and all data about kids safe.
I would imagine a locked down kids account on iPhone would be good enough - but again, its iPhone so its expensive. But if kids don’t damage it physically, then the device lasts a long time with parental controls.
But I don’t know if there’s another reason why iPhone is being considered when it comes to giving kids smartphones.
Edit: Would a iPhone with Screen time → Content & Privacy Restrictions turn on not be a better option? I think you can customize the phone the way you like.
I’ve thought about this. I’m not convinced that devices aimed at teenagers or kids in general with the pure aim of simply being a locked down device preventing access to things is actually teaching self control.
A bit like the under 16 bans, what happens when people suddenly turn 17? Do we then have a problem with a sudden access to “harmful” content?. The other issue is not every child will have a locked down device so there is to some extent a exclusionary space which kids that have these devices are in.
I think more needs to be done to teach kids not to care about “influencers”, and perhaps introduce the that these people are just “paid to say stuff”, and are just advertisers. I think awareness long term is what is required rather than sticking head in sand.
Just keep in mind, these phones are basically just off the shelf phones, and you can lock down what is installed with parental controls already. They are intended to sell their own bundled apps, and branding, which may very well be the real motive. Are they as secure? Who knows.
You will pay a lot for these devices and I’m not really sure they’re a good idea.
Don’t know anything about Gabb or TinCan, but if you’re reading Haidt’s book, I recommend you also look into its critiques. Some of the researchers on whom Haidt’s book is based have come out to criticize his conclusions, which they label as distortions of their research.
Tech journalist Taylor Lorenz did a great report on it that I recommend, in which she interviewed Danah Boyd, who is one of the researchers who disagrees with Haidt’s conclusions.
The rationale that I see in Haidt’s and other books like Determined by Robert Sapolsky points to the development of structures of the brain (most notably the prefrontal cortex aka PFC) during this time as a rationale to take extra care around what children are exposed to at these earlier ages versus adults. A developed PFC is the grey matter that correlates most with the traits of adulthood like less risk taking, more planning, and resiliency to major life events and trauma. The PFC doesn’t fully mature until 25, but the major changes occur during puberty which is why laws and traditions around adulthood, consent, and military service gravitate around 16 - 21.
That said, if these models of child development are valid, blanket laws like KOSA are in no way going to address the issues Haidt points out. That’s where I like the idea of using tech to help with knowing they have an SOS button so they can freely move about and rather than calling when we get to our friends house to check in like we did in the 90s, we can have their location and that they have an SOS click ready to notify me if something happens.
I think this is something parents should do, but also it breaks down for most parents as this is also a common age for rebellion and experimentation for kids. Anything you say or do as a parent will be used as evidence that you’re an old fart that doesn’t know what they are talking about. I had to do a lot of dumb shit before I understood the WHY of things. This is a good thing as it helps you know what rules do and don’t matter but also could get you into trouble. That said, I don’t think the advice of, “just tell them influencers don’t matter and ignore what your peer group says about you… they’re just jealous” is applicable in all or even most cases. I don’t have teenagers yet, but I was a little shit so can’t imagine mine falling too far from the tree.
I agree with this, I don’t want these features in the tech I use risking my kids privacy. I hadn’t really thought too deep on these features existing in our vetted phones. I just assumed that because this market existed it may not be possible. The iphone or iwatch with restrictions may be a way to go. That said, I’m not a huge fan of Apple’s walled garden and prefer my kids grow up on a healthy diet of Linux and open source.
Yeah, this doesn’t surprise me. Haidt is a good storyteller and often to tell good stories you have to lie about the size of the fish a bit. Yuval Noah Harari gets a lot of slack from Historians for doing this but it’s simplification for the simpleton like me who doesnt know shit about child psychology.
I do have it noted to follow up on the other positions he lays out in his book and I’m not trying to claim this book has it all figured out or we should take the conclusions to make KOSA the fucking outcome, but this story aligned with my gut instinct and I am open to learn what’s wrong with Haidt’s model as I go. In general I think social media is net negative for most use cases and I left Facebook and Twitter in 2017 and only returned to Twitter for a couple years for work related activity and every time I’m on it I just feel like garbage compared to forums and smaller online and in person communities.
Thanks for the link I’ll add this to my listening list. There’s definitely a fine balance to make here and nothing stirs up throwing privacy out the window like “children’s safety”.
It is largely hypothesis in regard to whether it is actually relevant to this debate. The counter argument to that is being exposed to things in small doses you will see as an older person is probably not a bad thing.
What I see is essentially “child washing” like we see with “green washing” basically a product which doesn’t really do a whole lot more but is splashed with the right kind of marketing to appeal to parents.
If you look at Gabb for example its purely about trying to sign parents up on a subscription for an expensive ecosystem of products and making it difficult for them to leave. They’re hoping that “Ill spend anything to protect my children” is going to sell it and outsource responsibility.
The real red flag there is they don’t actually tell you what phone it is that they are selling besides it being “a Samsung” but based on the pictures I’d say it’s their entry level phones like a Samsung Galaxy A15 (which is about $200 USD) . Here’s some choice reviews from reddit. There are countless more threads in /r/dumbphones.
988 is the s*icide hotline. It censors “harmful” words, and because it doesn’t have any internet access, you can’t fill the survey out. It’s just frustrating when someone’s trying to help, and every other word they’re using is censored.
At least it no longer outright blocks any incoming messages with the letters “http” anywhere.
Hi all! I have a project that I just got started on and I’ll be posting my discoveries here as I go on.
A friend of mine recently was able to get a Gabb Phone (specifically a “4 Pro”) for a cheap price of 50 bucks (75% off). He asked if I wanted to tinker with it and see how it worked, so I did. Even though I have my own phone (an iPhone), I still thought it may be interesting to see how this works. While I haven’t done much work on it yet I can post some information that isn’t really out there. If you want to see the intended use of it you can go to their website: Gabb Phone 4 Pro | Safe Phone for Kids & Teens
First of all, this is not some revolutionary piece of software like they claim to be. This is literally an Android phone with Samsung Knox Suite on it. There are a lot of restrictions designed to provide security. The ones I have found will be listed. Also, as soon as I received the phone, I removed the SIM card before turning it on, and have effectively airgapped it. Gabb is known to lock phones that have been tampered with so I will NOT let that happen. This device is currently running Android 14.
Restrictions and Limitations
Apps
There are the following preinstalled apps. The following cannot be removed or terminated:
MyGabb (Always running in the background, cannot terminate process)
GabbID (seems to be a login for your Gabb account)
Gabb Music (a “clean” music service by gabb which honestly is a complete cash grab)
Gabb Messenger (“safe” alternative to Messages)
Gabb Weather (which actually can be uninstalled)
Gabb Phone (a modified version of the Phone app)
Photos (Gabb has modified this app to only work with GabbID)
Most default apps have been removed. The following are preinstalled with the phone, and nothing else:
The 6 apps discussed above
My Files, Contacts, Play Store, Settings, Knox Manage, Notes, Camera, Calendar, Clock, Gallery, Knox Remote Support (which seems to be unfunctional), VLC, Knox Browser (I will get into this as it is not what you think), and Calculator.
Samsung Management by Knox is in place. They seem to be using Knox Suite and connect each phone to their Knox system. The domain connected to this is corp.gabbwireless.com as seen in Knox Manage. This domain is unaccessible and must be some sort of VPN that the phone connects to when connected to the Gabb network. This is likely the brains of the operation.
You probably noticed that I mentioned a browser on the apps list, which makes no sense when they advertise no web browsing. Well, the catch is that everything is blocked, and I mean everything. Even their home page and Gabb support page which they bookmarked themselves from the factory (lol), are blocked.
Restrictions I have found
Before you ask, developer tools refused to activate. Clicking the build number immediately brings a popup saying “Setting is not available”.
Samsung account is disabled
There is a Google for Work system profile under Accounts, which is unremovable. The user is also unable to add any accounts. If anyone knows what this is for I would love to know, the domain ends in “@ANDROID-for-work.gserviceaccount.com”.
VPN settings are completely disabled
Only apps from Google Play and Galaxy Store can be installed. Unknown app installation is completely disabled Background Processes (that are different)
Gabb Cloud Sync
GabbServices (this is another backend tool although it does strangely not have admin rights on the phone)
Knox Service Plugin
Separated Apps
Enrollment Service
So the project begins. If any of you have ideas on how to remove Gabb, I’d be glad to know. Mainly annoyed that they are advertising this as something only they can do when it’s not very custom at all lol.
TLDR cash grab to get subscribers on their ecosystem.
You can control all this with the parental controls.
As a former employee of gabb, I warn all parents to stay away from gabb. They not only cater to children, but to child rapist and murders who use their devices while they are on parole. And there are a lot of them that use gabb. When your gabb phone is replaced because it doesn’t work, gabb will recycle the phones that were returned because of an issue, and they will give it as a replacement to other customers, even if you are within the 1 year manufacturer warranty, you will not get a new device, but a used device and this includes watches too. Gabb doesn’t do a good job with resetting these phones because parents will call in and say they are receiving calls and texts on their gabb phones that are threatening and sexual from other phone numbers that they didn’t authorize on their child’s phone. Gabb product is crap and the majority of their products have constant issues that make their devices unreliable and more stress than it’s worth for the parents. I would NEVER recommend gabb to anyone as it is a horrible product that is not worth all the trouble and hours trying to fix your device that is brand new. Gabb has an F rating on BBB because they are terrible. Gabb can’t get their website to work correctly, nor their devices and software to work and be reliable. It amazes me how a company this bad can still be operating and not be shut down.
A few other threads say the support is absolutely atrocious and they are told that there is “high volume”. Everyone seems to be complaining about the quality of the apps.
I feel like I am reading my own experience here. I tried to cancel via email on 12/2, support replied on 12/24 telling me to call, I called and of course lines were tied up due to high volume. On 12/26 they closed my request due to “non response.” I tried reopening via email with no response. I was charged again today and I called and they could not refund back to 12/2. The supervisor was unable to call me until Wednesday (5 days). This company lacks the basics of customer service. I cant imagine they will or should survive much longer.
Parents, please save yourselves hours of anguish and don’t get started with this company in any capacity.
All I can say is don’t get a Gabb whatever you do. This company is the absolute worst and lacks customer service. We ended up cancelling after less than a year. If you ever need help they will tell you volume is high and it will take weeks to get a response. When we got the phone it took two weeks of back and forth to get it set up due to a poor SIM card. The phone didn’t work at my kids school which they blamed on the school. Lie as every others kids phone worked there. When we tried to cancel followed their protocol twice and they still didn’t respond. Finally when we were able to finally reach someone at Gabb to cancel they didn’t tell us you have to factory reset the phone before canceling if you have any chance of trading it in. Paid $200 to cancel contract early. We bought the phone and it was absolutely worthless afterward. Absolute mess
Don’t do it. Honestly, we paid $45/month for it which is way more than others out there and it sporadically worked… She would go a whole day sometimes when she could not receive or make calls or texts. The apps they are allowed to download are scarce and you can’t download any of her sports team communication apps which she needs for her team log-ins etc… We were looking for something safer for our 12 year old but this did not work for us. Customer service is terrible, I was locked out of my parent control app for the last few months. No help, no service, no connection, just terrible. In my opinion go with Apple, as a parent you have a TON of control over the content, apps, screen time, websites, etc… And it will be CHEAPER than this rip-off for sporadic service. Additionally, they charged me an early termination fee of $150 which is total bull crap given the fact that the phone barely worked. DON’T BUY FROM THEM.
We had issues too. OP may not be talking about network coverage specifically…for us, the phone would just entirely disconnect from the network and would require workarounds daily to be able to call in/out. Their customer service was horrible and they just stopped responding to me instead of offering to send a new phone or anything. They were just like, “welp, good luck then…we don’t know.” I was so ticked. I’d just bought the phone like 2 months prior and it didn’t have damage or anything. So for me, the service rarely worked, same as OP said, but it was the overall service, not that the network coverage was bad. When I was researching our issue, I saw several others complaining about the same problem. This was the fall of 2021 so hopefully they’re better now but we cancelled, so I wouldn’t know.
There are many more complaints, and people giving experiences (too many to list). Obviously there are some positive advertorials from places like PC Mag but that’s to be expected. Anyone who has had the device for some time hates it.
Thanks for taking the time to dive into deeper than I was able to do yet!
The parent population is a tired and busy class of folks who have limited time and learn a lot through other parents. Despite my own hesitation with this software, the marketing absolutely appeals to me on weaker days and with the right wellmeaning friend singing its praises. I really like the term childwashing as I just see it everywhere yet still don’t have many real solutions to work with so when I see something remotely promising it’s hard not to give into what they are selling.
So, I think the real technical solution is to get either an iphone, iwatch, or graphene type phone. BTW I already have a graphene pixel tablet we use for long trips that stays on airplane mode as we’ve pre downloaded a few open source paint and other activity apps and YouTube videos. Honestly my son plays with timers for hours.
Anyways, my main needs really would be some device with limited service that respects privacy and enables the communication and SOS like features. I have considered meshtastic but agaom haven’t looked into it deeply because… time and such: https://meshtastic.org/
Maybe for now it just needs to be a graphene phone with my own set of restrictions and here’s a concept continuously having conversations with them about what and how they experience the world.
Pretty much the snake oil salesmen of the current era. We see them with various phones whether they be selling freedom or privacy, etc. They’re usually expensive phones from crappy ODMs or entry level phones with a huge price tag and subscription.
There’s nearly always some kind of paid ecosystem involved, and I suspect it’s because a device like this requires very little physical infrastructure. Buy phones from ODM (Original Design Manufacturer), make deal provide MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) services, hire some developers in a country and pay them basically nothing, put marketing paint on a website and ship product. Collect return. Minimal effort is required to keep the money making machine going. Pay for team to continue marketing, spamming social media, in order to obtain more subscriptions. If the whole thing becomes too much work then sell it to someone else and make even more money.
[u/No_Caterpillar2839]• 2mo ago
Gabb has an F rating on BBB
and it’s true. There’s 44 negative complaints at the time of writing, and I flipped through the pages they do seem real (too specific) and certainly not AI generated, over quite a long time frame.
It’s important to remember children are people too and have a right to some privacy as well. One other product I saw, literally creates alerts for every video, song email or message the child interacts with even from their friends. I think that’s a bit creepy, and it’s important to remember children are people and not pets. You can likely remember when you were a child having conversations with other kids that you probably would not have had when if an adult was constantly watching, surveilling, hovering and keeping tabs. That is entirely normal and I can certainly remember such situations.
Devices can be used by abusive parents too, (we’ve heard of some cases like that), particularly when those parents have beliefs that fall outside of the general consensus of normalcy in a community.
I think it needs to be approached as a sliding window, as a child ages they should be given more agency and independence. At age 15-17 etc, or thereabouts they should be practically into adulthood or close to it. Everyone is different. People that are over 18 are not magically more mature in the world, in fact I’ve met people in their 30s and 40s which, frankly are less mature than some teenagers. It happens. What is interesting is in most places a child can obtain a driver’s license at around 16, which I’d argue is a far more serious responsibility.
Communication builds trust and a relationship where they are far more likely to come to you “as a friend” to tell you about something that is a concern/seek advice rather than “as a parent” which will instruct/command the right solution/behavior.
That’s the most fun part, they grow up so quickly so it’s important to enjoy the time you have with them. Find some interests, to share together, that will stimulate a healthy online consumption. With YouTube there are pretty much channels on every interest known to humankind.
The issue is when people just put a tablet or something into a young child’s hands, pay no attention to it and then wonder why the algorithm has simply made the decisions it has.
Here’s an interesting one for you. Search for “955 Kacena Road, Suite A Hiawatha, IA 52233-1327 + Wireless”. I counted many “wireless” companies listing that as it’s address.
Modern phones come with advanced and granular parental controls already, you can make an iPhone as restrictive as you want as a parent. I would stick with a mainstream phone and just lock it down using the built-in controls.
The three types of aggregated well- and/or ill-being outcomes yielded inconsistent associations with general SMU (also called time spent using SM, general SNS use, or the frequency of SM checking). As for aggregated well-/ill-being, one meta-analysis yielded no association [6], and another a small positive association with general SMU [12]. As for aggregated well-being, one meta-analysis yielded a small negative [6], and another a small positive association with general SMU [15]. Remarkably though, his latter meta-analysis also reported a small positive association with aggregated ill-being [15]. Finally, general SMU was consistently associated with higher levels of depression/depressive symptoms [4,6,12,16] and anxiety [6,12], but, again surprisingly, also with higher happiness levels [12].
Despite this uncertainty, studies that find an effect, whether negative or positive, repeat the same pattern: the magnitude of the relationship is small. In other words, even if social media use did influence young people’s mental well-being, this would do little to explain why the health crisis among young people has increased.
Alternatively, I believe that the constant use of social media and its correlation with well-being is actually a consequence rather than a cause of a set of circumstances that have become more hostile towards young people. From limited independent mobility in their environment—influenced both by the shift toward car-oriented city design and the fear of “stranger crime”—to reduced time for personal projects—influenced both by increased academic pressures and growing economic problems that limit their options. These factors—not to mention policies that were conceived as a result of these factors—have influenced the reduction of opportunities for independent outdoor activities that are important for their development and which adult-supervised activities cannot compensate for. The use of digital technologies serves as a quick relief from the pressures that surround them.
I recommend reading Patti Valkenburg and her differential susceptibility model. Rather than arguing about whether social media is good or bad, she attempts to unify research to nuance the effects per person. As she noted, the disparity in research findings on the effects of social media is not unique, but is also repeated in other research on the effects of media. She suggests that this problem is due to psychology’s general approach of seeking generalizable results useful for policy rather than focusing on variations per person: each person is unique and experiences stimuli differently, and by collapsing these experiences into an average result, you end up finding little or no effect of the variable studied.
This is not entirely accurate. The brain development process is different for each individual and is influenced by the diversity of experiences they have in their environment. There is no specific age at which the brain fully develops; rather, it is a continuous, gradual process that can differ from person to person. For some, it may be before the age of 25, while for others it may take until the age of 30 -see myth number 3 in the book-:
Other reviews of the research have noted similar developmental trends in gray and white matter. Age‐related increases in white matter coincided with gray matter decreases throughout adolescence, with an acceleration in the loss of prefrontal cortex gray matter occurring between the ages of 23 and 30 years
Why not use the recommendations already available on the website or forum? You can use a Pixel or iPhone device and implement parental controls via DNS—you can even do this at the router level, such as with Flint from Gl.inet, to prevent them from accessing these websites through other devices in the home, including their friends’ devices when they are at home.
