Bark Kids

This app makes me feel trapped. I don’t even do anything bad on my phone like at all. This is an invasion of privacy not protection. This app will make you kids not want to talk to you, trust me. I am 14 and my dad put this on my phone. I understand that he wants to keep me safe but I deserve privacy. 1 he can see the messages between me and my mom and those should be private. All messages between me and family should be PRIVATE. But no Im trapped. I used to be able to vent to my friends and get help but now I have bark on my phone and all of it was taken from me. This app is one of the reasons I cut myself cause I was always stressed about it, not because I do anything wrong but because the filter is so sensitive and labels everything as “sexual content” or something bad when its not. And every time my dad saw that on the bark thing he would make me explain but even though I told him the truth I don’t think it ever sounded believable. So it made me feel like every time he did the bark scan I was gonna get in trouble for something I didn’t even do. This app is just a place where a bunch of privacy invaders get together and watch their children like a spy. Its annoying, stressful, privacy intensive, and depressing. Please, for your childs mental health, DO NOT MAKE THEM GET THIS. Don’t believe any of the good things people say about this app please. Its all terrible.

(This is coming from a teen boys perspective) So my mother put this on my phone because I was doing things that a 13 year old should never be doing on the internet which is why it didn’t come as a surprise to me when she put this on my phone. I really couldn’t deny that I needed this sooooo yea. I understand why you would need this as a parent. As a teen tho it’s quite annoying. One time I was talking in a group chat and we were talking about how we were all gonna block someone’s contact who wasn’t even in the chat and it was reported to my mom as bullying and she ended up using this app to find out all the drama that was going on because it was all counted as bullying and violence. However even after all this I still get the point of the app and it works very good (maybe a little too good) but it’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened to me and I understand why this was put onto my phone. All the reviews before me are very hateful and honestly don’t complain about your parents being concerned about ur well being. Does it invade a quarter of ur privacy, yes. Can it be annoying, yes. But it’s all to keep u safe and honestly people that complain that the world is ending because of this need to get a life and stop being so hateful. It doesn’t make u cool by hating things or using profanity all the dang time. Most people are just mad because it exposes them for what they actually do and say.

My parents forced me to download this. I understand that parents should want the best for their children, and should be concerned for their safety. Apps like this however, are way too far. It works absolutely horribly. It alerts my parents when even just my friends do something bad, meaning that not only do I not get privacy but they don’t either. And sometimes, it alerts me even if nothing is wrong. This makes me just feel like I get no privacy whatsoever. This app just scares kids away from making mistakes, knowing their parents will find it. It takes me personally to the point where just picking up my phone is causing me anxiety, knowing even one wrong choice could ruin my life almost. Maybe instead of scaring kids from making mistakes, let them make them and they can learn from them. Otherwise, when they are finally free from people trying to barge into their private life, they will not know what is good or bad. They are yet to learn the painful consequences of their mistakes. Also, it causes my phone to work quite poorly. As soon as this was put onto my device, it started to get quite glitchy. All of the apps we connected it to immediately started to not work. They would say there was “no network” even though I was connected to wifi with full bars. Parents, if you are reading this, please don’t download this for your kids. Stop thinking only of yourself and your control over your kids. If you really wanted the best for them, you wouldn’t want them to feel this way.