Keeping your kids safe while traveling (online edition)

I think we all as parents are aware, now more than ever, of the dangers of online privacy. The lines when traveling seems even trickier because while you want to share your experiences with friends and family, you also don’t want to share important details that risk your safety with the world.

For us, we have a lot of followers from our skoolie build, which albeit very cool, leaves me feeling very uneasy with what we choose to share publicly. We also are believers in not everything being everyones business and hold our privacy as sacred even without strangers being involved. So without sacrificing our transparency we limit what and when we choose to post, which may be obvious to those who follow us as we don’t post consistently on most platforms! We also really try to be in the moment and we can’t do that if our brains are thinking about what shot would be the best to post instead of just enjoying those experiences with our kids and being present while trying to freeze those memories.

Here are some quick tips to keeping your kids safe while also being able to share your coolest memories!

First off, we never post our locations in real time. Only our close friends and family know our wherabouts and any given time unless we are stationary for a long period and even then it’s still mostly friends and family. We try our best not to disclose exact campground specifics or campsite numbers or free camping spot coordinates. I will favorite and save images and geotags for after we have left an area and I won’t post route information until after we have finished the trip. At that point - I’m sharing all the things!

Second, while we do post our kids faces - we try not to make our posts specifically about just the kids. We do not currently partner with brand deals, influencer contracts or make money off of our social media, we aren’t strangers to the concept of exploiting kids for monetary gain or clout (I mean, just search instagram for travel families and it’s pretty much all you’ll see) and we just aren’t about that. Nor are we interested in being travel or family influencers….we do however love connecting with other traveling or full time families and like to stay relatable with those who may feel inspired to convert their own vessel & travel in the same ways - having kids show up in that way is important to us but also not priority. They also are at the ages where they don’t quite understand that online means forever and like to keep up with comments and views in a “hey look ma, I’m famous!” way. Seeing their favorite photos of themselves that have been shared is fun for them, but constant conversations about online safety happen very frequently.The way they feel about their photos now, and how they will feel about it as they get old very well could change and we want to respect that. Anything that is posted OR could be potentially embarrassing is ran by them and even then I always hesitate. And let’s be real here, people on the internet can be MEAN and honestly inhumane sometimes which is a sad reality that we live in. Have you read TikTok comments? It’s like another world!

Third, outside of names and ages we do not share any intimate personal information about our kids publicly. I feel like that goes without saying but strangers on the internet should never know the schools that your children attend, the names of their teachers, the exact places that your kids activities are, the routines you have or any other information that could potentially lead them to your children regardless of whether that will lead to anything nefarious or not. Just out of simple respect for kids wellbeing and privacy.

Sometimes it’s easy to overshare online, especially because it’s exciting to share and keep everyone in the loop…BEEN THERE! But we can do our best! Stay safe, guys!