How to Protect Children's Privacy Online and With AI

• Teach kids to share ideas and questions with AI, never personal details.

• For under-17s, choose a child-focused tool like AIKI over adult chatbots.

• Turn off chat history and data-training options in any tool you do use.

• Make privacy a repeated family habit, not a one-off rule.

• Model the behaviour yourself so kids copy what they see you do.

Privacy with AI means controlling what personal information your child shares and what a tool does with it afterwards. Every time a child types a message, uploads a photo, or asks a question, they may be sharing data that a company can store or process. Protecting privacy is simply about helping them get the full learning benefit without revealing who they are.

The reassuring part is that a child almost never *needs* to share anything personal to learn well. A maths problem, a history question, or an English paragraph works perfectly without a full name, a school, an address, or a face. The habit to build is easy to remember: share the question, not yourself.

• Fine to share: homework questions, a paragraph to check, a topic to explain. • Never share: full name, home or school address, phone number, passwords. • Avoid uploading: photos of your child, ID documents, or family details. • Be careful with: birthdays, location clues, and 'about me' descriptions.

General tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot are designed for adults, so their default settings and responses aren't tailored to a 5–17-year-old. AIKI and the AIKI Method offer the same calibre of technology, but built specifically for children and supervised by parents, which shapes how privacy is handled from the ground up.

With adult chatbots, conversations may be stored, reviewed, or used to train future models unless you find and change those settings yourself. That's a lot to manage for a busy parent. A child-focused option like AIKI is built around a parent dashboard, age-appropriate responses, and clearer data boundaries, so protecting privacy isn't something you have to reconfigure every time your child logs on.

• Parental oversight: you can see and shape how your child uses the tool. • Age-appropriate design: answers and prompts suit a child, not an adult. • Clearer data handling: built around family use rather than mass adult use. • Fewer distractions: less exposure to unrelated content while studying.

Start by turning off data-sharing settings, then teach one clear rule your child can actually remember. Most tools let you disable chat history and 'help improve the model' options in a couple of taps — do this once for every tool the family uses. Then agree on a simple household rule such as: 'AI helps with schoolwork, but we never tell it who we are.'

Here's an everyday example. Ten-year-old Leo wants help understanding photosynthesis. Instead of typing 'I'm Leo from Oakwood Primary and I don't get this,' he learns to type 'Explain photosynthesis simply for a 10-year-old.' Same great help, zero personal data shared. Practise this kind of rewrite together a few times and it quickly becomes second nature.

• Set up accounts together and keep AI use in a shared space, like the kitchen table. • Disable chat history and model-training options in each tool's settings. • Use a nickname, or nothing at all, instead of a real name. • Do a friendly two-minute check-in each month: 'What did you ask AI this week?'

Teens benefit most from good judgement, not just rules, because they'll use AI when you're not in the room. The goal shifts from supervision to helping them decide what's safe to share and what isn't. Frame it as a life skill, like locking a door, rather than a restriction that will disappear the moment they're older.

Talk through realistic situations: pasting a whole essay that mentions family details, uploading a photo for 'feedback', or oversharing in a personal prompt. Encourage them to keep a clear line between the *task* and *themselves*. For focused study, a supervised tool built on the AIKI Method still adds value here, offering structure without constantly nudging them to hand over personal information.

• Before sharing, ask: 'Would I be comfortable putting this on a public noticeboard?' • Remove names and identifying details from documents before pasting them. • Never share login details, even to 'get help with an account'. • Review app permissions and switch off anything that isn't needed.

Is it safe for my child to use ChatGPT for homework?

It can work if you adjust the privacy settings and stay involved, but these tools are designed for adults. For under-17s, a child-focused option like AIKI is a stronger default, because privacy protections and age-appropriate responses are built in rather than something you have to configure yourself.

Can AI tools store what my child types?

Yes. Many tools store conversations by default and may use them to improve their models. You can usually turn this off in the settings by disabling chat history and training options. Teaching your child to never include personal details adds a second, reliable layer of protection on top of that.

Should my child use their real name with AI?

No. There's no learning benefit to sharing a real name, so a nickname or nothing at all is better. Encourage your child to focus on the question or topic itself, keeping their identity separate from the task they need help with.

At what age can my child use AI without supervision?

There's no single right age. Younger children need close supervision and shared use, while teens can earn more independence once they consistently show good judgement about what's safe to share. Even then, occasional check-ins and privacy-safe tools help keep good habits firmly in place. You know your child best, so trust your own judgement alongside these guidelines.