Family Link Disclosure for Parents of Children under 13 (or applicable age in your country)

Your trust is our priority, and letting your child have a Google Account is a big decision. Take a minute to review this important info to learn more.

Google’s Family Link app is designed to help you set ground rules and guide your child’s experience as they explore online. Your child will become part of your Google family group, which you can use to share Google services with your child and up to four other family members. You’ll be able to add another parent later to help supervise your child’s account. Parents can use Family Link to do things like:

• Set screen time limits on your child’s Android or ChromeOS devices;

• See the location of your child’s signed-in and active Android devices;

• Approve your child’s downloads and purchases on Google Play and Stadia or limit the visibility of content based on maturity ratings;

• Help your child choose the types of activity that can be saved in their Google Account and how it may be used to personalize their experience;

• Manage settings such as SafeSearch for Google Search;

• Review your child’s app permissions, such as microphone, camera, and contacts access on Android and ChromeOS;

• Change the content, access and other settings for YouTube experiences (where available), including YouTube and YouTube Kids.

While Family Link’s parental controls can help you supervise and manage your child's experience, there are limitations that you should keep in mind:

• While many of Family Link’s parental controls can be managed on the web, you’ll need the Family Link app on Android or iOS to manage certain features like screen time limits.

• Settings like SafeSearch, Chrome website restrictions, and Play Store filters can help limit access to inappropriate content, but they are not perfect. Even with these controls on, your child may still access content you don’t want them to see.

• Parental approval is not required when your child re-downloads an app or other content that was previously approved, installs an update to an app (even an update that adds content or asks for additional data or permissions), or downloads shared content from your Google Play Family Library.

• Some Family Link features have limited availability, and require specific settings and circumstances in order to work. For example, blocking apps is only available when your child is signed in to a compatible Android or ChromeOS device, and seeing your child’s device location in the Family Link app is only available when their Android device is powered on and connected to the internet.

When your child turns 13 (age may vary by country), they can choose to manage their account on their own without your supervision.

For your child to have their own Google Account or profile, we may need your permission to collect, use or disclose your child’s information as described in this Privacy Notice and the Google Privacy Policy. When you allow your child to use our services, you and your child are trusting us with your information. We understand this is a big responsibility and work hard to protect your information and put you in control. You can choose whether your child can manage their activity controls for things like Web & App Activity, YouTube History, and, in applicable regions, linking certain Google services.

This Privacy Notice for Google Accounts and Profiles Managed with Family Link, for Children under 13 (or applicable age in your country) and the Google Privacy Policy explain Google’s privacy practices. To the extent there are privacy practices specific to your child’s account or profile, such as with respect to limitations on personalized advertising, those differences are outlined in this Privacy Notice.

This Privacy Notice does not apply to the practices of any third party (non-Google) apps, actions or websites that your child may use. You should review the applicable terms and policies for third party apps, actions, and sites to determine their appropriateness for your child, including their data collection and use practices.

Information We Collect

Once you grant permission for your child to have a Google Account or profile, their account or profile will generally be treated like your own with respect to the information that we collect. For example, we collect:

Information you and your child create or provide to us.

As part of the account or profile creation process, we may ask for personal information like first and last name, email address, and birthdate. We collect the information you or your child provide, such as your online contact details, which are necessary for us to contact you to request consent. We also collect the information your child creates, uploads, or receives from others when using their account or profile, such as when your child saves a picture in Google Photos or creates a document in Google Drive.

Information we get from your child’s use of our services.

We automatically collect and store certain information about the services your child uses and how your child uses them, like when your child enters a query in Google Search, talks to the Google Assistant, or watches a video on YouTube Kids. This information includes:

• Your child’s apps, browsers & devices

  We collect information about the apps, browsers, and devices your child uses to access Google services, including unique identifiers, browser type and settings, device type and settings, operating system, mobile network information including carrier name and phone number, and application version number. We also collect information about the interaction of your child’s apps, browsers, and devices with our services, including IP address, crash reports, system activity, and the date, time, and referrer URL of your child’s request. For example, we collect this information when a Google service on your child’s device contacts our servers, like when they install an app from the Play Store.

• Your child’s activity

  We collect information about your child’s activity in our services, which, depending on your child’s settings, we use to do things like recommend apps they might like on Google Play. You can choose whether your child can manage their activity controls. Your child’s activity information that we collect may include things like search terms, videos they watch, voice and audio information when they use audio features, people with whom they communicate or share content, and Chrome browsing history they’ve synced with their Google Account. If your child uses our services to make and receive calls or send and receive messages, for example by using Google Meet or Duo, we may collect telephony log information. Your child can visit their Google Account to find and manage activity information that’s saved in their account or profile and you can also help manage their activity information by signing in to your child’s Google Account, or accessing their profile in Family Link.

• Your child’s location information

  We collect information about your child’s location when they use our services. Your child’s location can be determined by using GPS, IP address, sensor data from their device, and information about things near their device, such as Wi-Fi access points, cell towers, and Bluetooth-enabled devices. The types of location data we collect depends in part on your settings and your child’s devices.

• Your child’s voice & audio information

  We may collect your child’s voice and audio information. For example, if your child uses audio activation commands (e.g., “OK, Google” or touching the microphone icon), a recording of the following speech/audio will be processed to respond to their request. Additionally, if your child’s Voice & Audio Activity option under the Web & App Activity setting is checked, recording of their voice interaction with Assistant on a signed-in device (plus a few seconds before) may be stored with their account.

We use various technologies to collect and store your child’s information, including cookies, pixel tags, local storage, such as browser web storage or application data caches, databases, and server logs. We do not require your child to provide more personal information than is reasonably necessary to use the Google products and services available for these accounts or profiles.

How We Use Information We Collect

Google’s Privacy Policy explains in greater detail how we may use the data Google collects in association with your child’s Google Account or profile. In general, we use your child’s information: to provide, maintain, and improve our services; to develop new services; to customize our services for your child; to measure performance and understand how our services are used; to communicate directly with your child in relation to our services; and to help improve the safety and reliability of our services.

We use different technologies to process your child’s information for these purposes. We use automated systems that analyze your child’s content to provide them with things like customized search results or other features tailored to how they use our services. And we analyze your child’s content to help us detect abuse such as spam, malware, and illegal content. We also use algorithms to recognize patterns in data. When we detect spam, malware, illegal content, and other forms of abuse on our systems in violation of our policies, we may disable their account or profile or take other appropriate action. In certain circumstances, we may also report the violation to appropriate authorities.

Depending on your child’s settings, we may use your child’s information to provide recommendations, personalized content, and customized search results. For example, depending on your child’s settings, Google Play may use information like apps your child has installed to suggest new apps they might like.

In addition, depending on your child’s settings, we may combine the information we collect among our services and across your child’s devices for the purposes described above. Depending on your child’s account or profile settings, their activity on other sites and apps may be associated with their personal information in order to improve Google’s services.

Google will not serve personalized ads to your child, which means ads will not be based on information from your child’s account or profile. Instead, ads may be based on information like the content of the website or app your child is viewing, the current search query, or general location (such as city or state). When browsing the web or using non-Google apps, your child may encounter ads served by other (non-Google) ad providers, including ads personalized by third parties.

Information Your Child Can Share

Your child may be able to share information, including photos, videos, audio, and location, publicly and with others, when signed in with their Google account or profile. When your child shares information publicly, it may be accessible through search engines like Google Search.

Information Google Shares

Information we collect may be shared outside of Google in limited circumstances. We do not share personal information with companies, organizations, and individuals outside of Google except in the following cases:

With consent

We will share personal information outside of Google with consent (as applicable).

With your family group

Your child’s information, including their name, photo, email address, and Play purchases, may be shared with members of your family group on Google.

For external processing

We provide personal information to our affiliates or other trusted businesses or persons to process it for us, based on our instructions and in compliance with this Privacy Notice, the Google Privacy Policy, and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.

For legal reasons

We will share personal information with companies, organizations or individuals outside of Google if we have a good-faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of the information is reasonably necessary to:

• meet any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request;

• enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations;

• detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues;

• protect against harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, our users or the public as required or permitted by law.

We may also share non-personally identifiable information (such as trends about the general use of our services) publicly and with our partners — like publishers, advertisers, developers, or rights holders. For example, we share information publicly to show trends about the general use of our services. We also allow specific partners to collect information from browsers or devices for advertising and measurement purposes using their own cookies or similar technologies.

Access to Your Child’s Personal Information

If your child has a Google Account, you can access, update, remove, export, and restrict the processing of your child’s information by signing into their Google Account. If you do not remember your child’s password, you can reset it through the Family Link app or Family Link settings on the web. Once signed in, you can use the various controls described in the Google Privacy Policy, such as Google activity controls, to help manage your child’s privacy settings and information.

If your child has a profile, you can access, update, remove, export, and restrict the processing of your child’s information through the Family Link app or Family Link settings on the web.

Your child will have the ability to delete their past activity in “My Activity,” and by default grant app permissions (including things like device location, microphone, or contacts) to third parties. You can also use Family Link to edit or modify your child’s Google Account or profile information, review app activity and app permissions, and manage your child’s ability to grant certain permissions to apps or third party services to access your child’s information.

If at any time you wish to stop further collection or use of your child’s information, you can delete your child’s Google Account or profile by clicking “Delete account” or “Delete profile” on your child’s Account or Profile Info page in the Family Link app or Family Link settings on the web. Your child’s account or profile information will be permanently deleted within a reasonable period of time.