The rise of the smartphone may be a great opportunity for marketers but parents with young children are finding out the hard way that easy access to apps carries a heavy penalty, with some kids racking up bills of thousands of pounds.
Phone regulator PhonepayPlus has published figures showing a 300% increase in the number of parents complaining about their children accessing smartphone.
The regulator found that 63% of 11 to 16 year olds have downloaded a free app on their phones with their parents sometimes finding themselves liable for bills of ‘hundreds or even thousands’ of pounds.
A report, “Children as Connected Consumers”, found that such free apps posed significant malware risks and exposed the owner to unlimited billing for in-app ‘extras’ – often without their consent.
Some fake versions of popular games such as Angry Birds and Cut the Rope charged users £15 every time the game was opened.
The report showed that children have also been targeted on social media sites. It cites one instance where they were encouraged to share a supermarket promotion on Facebook which subsequently misled people into participating in a premium rate phone competition.
In response PhonepayPlus recommends parents register phones as belonging to a child and introduce controls through their network, such as pay as you go or blocking certain features.
