Mom Of College Freshman Warns Other Parents Of A ‘Nationwide Outage’ Of Life360 — ‘That’s Why Her Location Showed At A Bar Instead Of Her Dorm Room’
She would never!
fizkes | Shutterstock A mother is warning other parents who use Life360 to keep tabs on their children that the platform experienced a nationwide outage after she received an alert at 1 a.m. that her daughter was not in her dorm room like she claimed she would be.
Instead, the app showed that the young woman was somewhere her mother never could have imagined her being past her bedtime!
The mother warned parents that Life360 was experiencing a ‘nationwide outage’ after it showed that her daughter was at a bar and not in her dorm room.
In a TikTok video that has been viewed over 55,000 times, Kelly, a mother of a college student, learned about the apparent outage in a Facebook group for moms of incoming freshmen.
A fellow parent’s daughter had alerted her that Life360 and Find My iPhone were “glitching out” on Friday night until around 2 a.m. Due to the issues the platforms were experiencing, the girl warned her mother that her location might appear to be different than where she reported she would be.
“That is why her daughter’s [location] was showing up at the beach and at a bar at one o’clock in the morning and not asleep in her dorm room,” Kelly said. “Just wanted to let everybody know!”
If you haven’t already figured it out by now, the girl was obviously lying to her mother and fabricated a story about a Life360 outage to avoid a lecture about being out at bars late at night.
Luckily, the mom wasn’t the only parent who was lied to regarding their child’s location.
“My daughter’s [Life360] glitched and showed her at a Frat party until 1 a.m.,” one Tiktok user commented.
“Same happened to us last year. Apple really has to fix things on Friday and Saturday nights. Sometimes Thursdays too,” another user wrote.
Other than the daughter’s witty quick-thinking, the video sparked a much bigger discussion: should parents really keep track of their college-aged children via Life360?
While the dynamic of every family is different, some people believe that it is inappropriate to keep tabs on your college students when they are constantly reminding them that they are mature adults.
How many mature adults still have their parents stalk them and remind them of their Friday night curfew?
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They at least deserve the privacy and trust we would normally extend to an adult we care about.
If they can make it to their own classes, prepare their own meals, and do their own laundry, they should certainly be able to stay out late when they want to without parents hovering over them.
However, some parents argue it's about safety.
During an episode of “The Doctors” regarding parents tracking their college-aged kids’ location, Demeka, a mother of a college junior and freshman, admitted that she and her husband both use tracking apps for safety reasons.
“I know it sounds bad, but let me explain. We use the app to monitor their locations for safety purposes. Not to spy, not because we think they’re irresponsible, but because we need to keep tabs on them when they’re on and off campus,” she says, adding that the apps give her “peace of mind.”
However, Family physician Deborah Gilboa argued that the apps do not make college students feel safe — and they may not even make parents feel at ease either.
“The problem really is that it doesn’t make them safer, and it does make us, in research, parents more anxious,” she explains.
“It makes us feel like, ‘I can’t stop watching. I have to watch every time they get on a train and every time they get off. Where are they? What are they doing? We’re second-guessing. And this is really a problem.”
Children, no matter how old they are, feed off of their parents’ anxiousness. If they are always stressed and monitoring their locations to make sure that they haven’t been abducted, they may be giving their children the impression that the world is a dangerous place that must be constantly feared.
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While parents should always teach their children to be mindful of their surroundings, they should not foster unnecessary paranoia.
Sending your kids off to college is undoubtedly a difficult transition, and it can be hard to let go of looking after them as you once did.
However, parents should keep in mind that as their kids enter adulthood, they are entitled to a little independence and should be free of a curfew. It is all a part of growing up.
And if your child happens to be at a bar in the middle of the night, it is not a technological glitch!
They are simply just enjoying themselves and their newfound freedom.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.