GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — A West Michigan-based website that helps parents identify and keep their kids away from inappropriate digital content is warning of a new Snapchat channel with content children may not be ready to see.
Cosmo After Dark, Cosmopolitan Magazine's new digital channel available through Snapchat Discover, features explicit discussions of sex. If you're not familiar with Cosmo, you can Google it to get the gist of the content. Cosmo After Dark started last week and is available Friday evenings.
It may be available to just about anyone with a Snapchat account and you may not be able to block it from your child's mobile device.
“(Cosmo After Dark is) leaving nothing to the imagination and so we wrote about it. Now we have a lot of people talking about it," Chris McKenna, the founder of ProtectYoungEyes.com, told 24 Hour News 8 Wednesday.
McKenna said concerns about access to the Cosmo content are best illustrated by a recent talk with a group of eighth-graders.
“These are 14-year-old kids," McKenna said. "I asked them how many of you have a Snapchat account of your own right now. Eighty percent of the room raised their hand.”
Snapchat is supposed to filter out adult content based on a subscriber’s age. But McKenna said several parents who follow his blog have tested the filter and were "finding some inconsistencies even in that.”
Parents can go into their child's settings and make sure their age is correct or set it to a younger status. That can only be done once. Another option is to take away the app or even take away the device.