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Child Security Applications

MNOs have already been very successful in marketing and distributing mobile solutions to children. 90%+ of children in developed European mobile markets over the age of 11 have a mobile phone of some description. In the US, while penetration is currently lower, it is growing faster to catch up. Most of these phones are purchased on behalf of the child by a parent or other carer, using the rationalisation that ownership provides a means of communication that enhances the child's safety. As far as the child is concerned, the phone is a status item and a means of communication with peers that is not subject to control and monitoring from parents or other authority figures.

Given a fundamental difference in the motivation between the bill payer (parent) and the user (child) it should not be surprising that issues arise about how the phone should be used, controlled and paid for. To maximise their success in this market, MNOs must seek to satisfy the current needs of the adult customers, without alienating the users (who will go on to be customers in their own right once they grow up). This is made more difficult by the fact that there is much confusion in this space, caused not just by the differences between adult and child motivation but also by ethical and legal issues surrounding how far parents and other carers should go in protecting the people they are responsible for and the increased possibilities offered by deployment of new technologies such as 3G and GPS. The minefield is made still more treacherous by the presence of vociferous bodies only too willing to publicise any perceived errors in judgment in a service offered to vulnerable members of society.

In this report, Mobile Market Development examines the youth market and the applications available to address issues of child security and concludes with nine recommendations for MNOs to help them in successful exploitation of this extremely important market segment.

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Table of Contents


1
Overview
1
2
Introduction
2
2.1
Background
2
2.2
Report Structure
2
3
The Youth Market
3
3.1
Overview
3
3.2
Young People's Usage of Mobile Phones
3
3.2.1
Surveys of Mobile Phone Usage Amongst the Young
5
3.3
Problems with children using mobile phones
6
3.3.1
Overview
6
3.3.2
The "Disassociated Paymaster"
7
3.3.3
Bullying and other Unsolicited Attention
8
3.3.4
Access to Inappropriate Content
11
3.3.5
Health Concerns
11
4
Regulatory and Commercial Approaches to Maintaining the Security of Children
13
4.1
Overview
13
4.2
The Regulatory Environment
13
4.2.1
The European Framework on Safer Mobile Use by Younger Teenagers and Children
13
4.2.2
CTIA Wireless Content Guidelines
14
4.2.3
Other Regulatory Approaches
15
4.3
The Commercial Environment
16
4.3.1
Operators' Child Safety Initiatives
16
5
Applications for Child Safety
19
5.1
Location-based Services/ Child Tracking
19
5.1.1
Overview
19
5.1.2
Problems with Child Location Services
20
5.1.3
Data Protection
20
5.1.4
UK Code of Practice for Passive Location Services
21
5.2
Child Location Applications
22
5.2.1
Mobiles2go
22
5.2.2
Teddyfone
23
5.2.3
FollowUs GPS
25
5.2.4
KidsOK
26
5.2.5
Kiditel
26
5.2.6
Globalpoint Technologies
27
5.2.7
Wherifone
27
5.2.8
Guardian Angel Technology, Inc
28
5.2.9
Cattrax
28
5.3
Content Filtering
29
5.3.1
Overview
29
5.3.2
Companies Offering Filtering and Blocking Technologies
29
5.3.3
Operators Offering Filtering Services
30
5.4
Family Packages
31
5.4.1
Disney Mobile
32
5.4.2
Sprint Nextel
35
5.4.3
Verizon Wireless
35
5.4.4
T-Mobile USA
36
5.5
Child-Friendly Handsets
37
6
Findings and Recommendations
39
6.1
Key Conclusions
39
6.2
Recommendations
41