AI chatbots and companion apps can be genuinely helpful, and they can also give confident wrong answers, collect personal details, or start to feel like a real friend. A little setup and one honest conversation go a long way.
Choose the tool, then check the settings
Pick an AI app that is meant for your child’s age rather than defaulting to whatever their friends use. Once it is installed, open its settings together and look for a few specific things.
- An age or teen setting, if the app offers one, turned on.
- Chat history and personalisation: decide together whether the app should remember past conversations.
- Any option to opt out of your child’s chats being used to train the AI, where that choice exists.
- Voice, image upload and location permissions turned off unless there is a clear reason for them.
What not to share with a chatbot
A chatbot is not a private diary. Agree a simple rule: no full name, address, school name, phone number, passwords, or photos of themselves. If an app ever asks for those to « continue, » that is a reason to stop and come to you.
Three things worth saying out loud
AI companions are not real friends. They are designed to be agreeable and always available, which can feel lovely and can also pull a child away from real people. It helps to name this gently rather than ban it.
Homework honesty. Using AI to understand something is different from handing in its answers as their own. Ask what their school allows, and treat AI like a tutor that explains, not a machine that does the work.
AI can be confidently wrong. These tools sometimes state made-up facts in a very sure voice. Encourage your child to check anything that matters against a trusted source.