This article is more than 1 year old

Be your own Big Brother: With the help of Apple, Facebook ... oh, HANG ON

(Don't fret, there are other options to keep tabs on kids)

Get appy

Apple's Find My Friends will help you out, if everyone's bought into their ecosystem

Apple's Find My Friends will help you, if everyone's bought into their ecosystem

What of smartphones, then? Will they do the job? Do you already have the app you need? For a while, the obvious solution to tracking with a phone was Google Latitude, but like so many other projects from the Chocolate Factory, it has been turned off, leaving users searching for another solution. Apple users' obviously have "Find my Friends", but that relies on everyone involved using the same platform.

FourSquare's split into two separate apps has – rightly in my view – annoyed an awful lot of its users, but there is some utility to Swarm. It can let your friends know when you're in a neighbourhood, though you still have to check in to specific locations. Again, that could be "near enough" for some purposes. There were some auto-check-in apps for FourSquare, but it seems recent changes have broken those; if you know of some that still work, do share them in the comments.

Facebook's Nearby Friends tool hasn't reached the UK yet. When it does, will you trust them?

Facebook's Nearby Friends tool hasn't reached the UK yet. When it does, will you trust them?

Another option in some areas – but not yet the UK – is Facebook's Nearby Friends feature. That can also let people know where you are, and show a map. You can restrict that information to specific friends, rather than all of them – useful given the loose definition of "friend" many have on the site. However, given the company's tendency to mess with privacy settings, you may well not feel comfortable that you'll remain in complete control.

Next page: Rolling your own

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like