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WhatsApp Adds New Parental Controls for Teen Accounts

Parents can set privacy and notification limits, while teens keep end-to-end encrypted messages and calls private.

  • Today, WhatsApp introduced flexible, optional parental controls to help guardians guide teenager experiences without reading over their shoulder.
  • Meta faces mounting regulatory pressure to protect minors following an $18 billion fine from 29 states in August to settle child safety lawsuits.
  • Guardians can manage settings for Meta AI, Channels, and Status, with all changes requiring a PIN; parents receive notifications when teens join groups of 30, 100, or 250 members.
  • The company stressed that personal messages and calls remain private and protected by end-to-end encryption, ensuring controls support open conversations rather than monitoring private chats.
  • Social media analyst Matt Navarra called the optional nature an "obvious weakness," arguing Meta reduced reliance on age verification by shifting responsibility to parents and questioning whether families will actually use the tools.
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48 Articles

Lean Left

WhatsApp has announced the launch of new optional parental controls to help parents and guardians monitor and limit teen interactions in the app.What you need to knowNew tools allow managers to configure

·São Paulo, Brazil
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Lean Right

WhatsApp announced on this Wednesday (30) new controls for parents of adolescents, a toolkit that helps to monitor contacts and groups and restrict channel, Status and Meta AI resources. The resources complement the updates made available to parents of under 13 years of age, released in March of this year. The new controls look at people aged 13 to 18 years, and arrive on the ECA Digital treadmill, which requires that user accounts up to 16 year…

·Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
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Lean Right

The messenger adds functions to define what boys do with states, canals and groups

·Vicente López, Argentina
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  • 45% of the sources are Center, 44% of the sources lean Right
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The Citizen broke the news in Johannesburg, South Africa on Wednesday, September 30, 2026.
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