Houseparty

June 2, 2022

Houseparty is a face-to-face social network where you can connect with people you know and potentially strangers. What parents need to know before they download this app for their child.

Houseparty (Rated 12+, Group Video Chat)

App store description: Houseparty is a face-to-face social network where you can connect with the people you care about most. The app makes connecting face-to-face effortless, alerting you when your friends are “in the house” and ready to chat so you can jump right into the conversation. The same goes for you opening the app! Your friends will know you’re in the app and ready to chat so that they can join you (…because rejected calls are so last year). House is truly the next best thing to hanging out in person. See your friends more often on Houseparty.

Problems

Maybe people your child does not know can join your child’s video chat without permission if the chat group is not locked. When a user is in a Houseparty group chat, a connection from one of the in-chat members can choose to join the group, even though they are not connected or known to the other users. Houseparty does give you the option to lock your conversations. When a discussion is closed, everyone is notified that the user has completed the

conversation, and if someone should try to join, they are blocked from doing that. If you allow your child to use Houseparty, we encourage you to get them into the habit of locking the conversation. If someone within the conversation unlocks the chat, everyone is notified that the discussion has been opened. One major issue with live streaming apps is unless the parent is sitting on their kid’s shoulder, they will not know what is happening or being said on the video chat, making accountability for children using this app very difficult.

Parental Controls

None.

Recommendation

Safe for children 13 years or older (with parental supervision).

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About the Author

Clayton Cranford

Clayton Cranford is a retired Sergeant from Orange County Sheriff's Department in California and owner of Total Safety Solutions LLC. Clayton is one of the nation’s leading law enforcement educators on social media, child safety, and behavioral threat assessments. Clayton is the author of the definitive book on cyber safety for families, “Parenting in the Digital World.” Clayton has more than 20 years of teaching experience and was awarded the 2015 National Bullying Prevention Award from the School Safety Advocacy Council, and the 2015 American Legion Medal of Merit. Clayton was a member of the County's Behavioral Threat Assessment Team, Crisis Negotiation Team, School Resource Officer program, and Juvenile Bureau.