It may be that you already know about Kik, which is a smartphone messaging app, like the old AOL Instant Messenger but for phones, and with the ability to add pictures and video. I felt hopelessly behind the times when my middle school class today told me in so many words that Facebook is old school, but that Kik, Twitter and Instagram are the latest avenues of communication for teens (at least middle schoolers). When I got on the internet at home to look up “teens using kik, twitter,” in the first six links that popped up three had the word nudes in the title! Here are two articles you can look at that discuss Kik: One, a blog entry by Mcafee, discusses how to manage Kik so that it’s safer. It also shows what the icon looks like so you can see if it’s on your teen’s phone. The other article on bewebsmart.com is more skeptical about Kik Messenger, noting that it is rated 17+ in the app store (at least for Iphone, Ipad and ITunes). The article also talks about how to block the download of apps based on their rating.
