UK online parental controls usage 2023

According to a 2023 survey of parents in the United Kingdom, around 30 percent of parents reported restricting access to inappropriate online content using platforms' safety modes. Approximately the same number of respondents reported using parental control built into the device by the manufacturer.

UK parents vs. apps

As an estimated 96 percent of children's apps available to UK users transmit GPS location or IP address to advertisers and/or data brokers, parents have reason to concern themselves with monitoring their kids' mobile usage. According to research conducted at the beginning of 2023, 70 percent of apps in the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store collected persistent identifiers. Additionally, 15 percent of TikTok users aged between 13 and 17 years had experienced anonymous trolling in the past month, as well as being exposed to sexualized images on the popular short-video platform, according to a survey conducted in the United Kingdom in 2022.

Not just monitoring: apps for parents cover several needs

In the first half of 2022, there were around 900 apps available to UK children, but only approximately 300 apps designed for parents. Approximately 78 of these were apps to help babies sleep, 72 were apps designed to track babies' rhythms, and only 20 apps available to UK parents were designed to keep and edit babies' photos. Despite their limited availability, baby photo apps for parents generated 674 thousand downloads in the first half of 2022, while fertility tracking apps generated five million downloads among UK users in the same period.

Parents in the United Kingdom (UK) who use selected tools to manage and monitor their children's internet usage as of November 2023, by age group

Characteristic	Share of repondents
Use any of these technical tools	73%
Parental controls built into the device by the manufacturer	32%
Content filters provided by your broadband internet service provider (e.g. BT, TalkTalk, Sky and Virgin Medial where the filters apply to)	30%
Restrict access to inappropriate online content - through things like Google SafeSearch, YouTube Restricted mode or TikTok Family Safety Mode	30%
Parental control software set up on a particular device used to go online (e.g. Net Nanny, McAfee Family Protection, Open DNS FamilyShield).	29%
Change the settings on your child's phone or tablet to stop apps being downloaded or stop in-app purchases	28%
Parental control software, settings or apps that can be used on your child’s phone or tablet to restrict access to content or manage their use of the device	26%
Apps that can be installed on a child’s phone to monitor which apps they use and for how long	14%