June 10, 2024 • 18 mins
Kids, phones and online safety is a big issue. So we’ve just dropped a special episode exploring the topic.
We talk with Rory Birkbeck of Safe Surfer, the NZ charity making it safer for kids to access the internet, about the issues and challenges of kids and phones. It’s collaboration with Samsung and their new kid-safe phone helping kids stay connected and safe online at the same time.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Today we're talking to Rory Birkbeck. He's a dad. He's
the founder and CEO of Safe Surfer.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
They've teamed up with Samsung New Zealand to launch a
kid safe Smartphonekday.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Rory, Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Hey Clint, Hey Jordan. How are you guys doing.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
I'm good mate, I'm fizzed.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (00:22):
Now, I don't know if you've gone through the back catalog, Rory,
but listeners out there that may have heard many months ago,
I'm very passionate about banning kids, stopping kids, holding young
kids getting phones in their hands when they are not
ready for them, full on smartphones.
Speaker 6 (00:38):
I just don't think a nine to ten eleven year
old should be able to access anything they want on
the internet. I'm super passionate about this. We've talked about
this in the podcast. It was one of our most
successful video raps that I did. So super keen to
talk to you today and what you're all about. So
start off with what is Safe Surfer?
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Yeah, so about eight years ago, as a dad, I
kind of embarked on a journey to protect our kids
and a friend to his kids, and yeah, it just
kind of led me to just figuring out that this
online safety world or the online world is just crazy.
Speaker 6 (01:14):
You know.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
It's kind of like the Parenting Hangover part two, I
feel like, or two point zero, where it's just yeah,
just the stuff that's out there is just so random,
so nuts, and we've been seeing it for so long,
but I think people are finally starting to realize. So,
like you were saying, you know, Safe Surfer really we
(01:37):
build online safety tech products. So we've kind of embarked
on like I'm a tech person and so basically we've
kind of built a whole bunch of really cool tech
and that's that's sort of been our journey with safe
Surfer and really excited today to be able to announce
that we are launching this Kid's Safe smartphone with Samsung.
(01:58):
So just a really awesome part partnership that has kind
of come together again just to build really the ultimate
tech armory for parents to be able to navigate the space.
As you're saying, you know, like there's a real need
to delay smartphones and delay particularly social media and apps,
(02:19):
and so kids are just getting just what they need
from our tech without getting too much too soon.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
Because what age do you find that currently what age
on average, are kids getting a smartphone?
Speaker 3 (02:32):
Yeah, so there's there's stats out there that about eighty
percent of kids have smartphones by the time there are
eleven wo wow, and that. Yeah, that just shows you
kind of the collective trap that parents have caught into.
And so look, I think the answer is that we
(02:53):
can't go can't go backwards with like dumb phones, like
I've tried to use a dumb phone myself in the past,
and the technology like we're just used to the custom
keyboards and the real smart stuff, you know. And so
I think what we need is actually because kids do
need phones, you know, they need to be in touch
with their parents and things like that. So what we
(03:13):
actually need is exactly what we've just built with Samsung,
which is just this calls and texts smartphone which is
fully robust, fully tamper proof so they can't get round it,
you know. And then yeah, you're able to kind of
give that to them, and then as they grow and mature,
you're able to step up and add the features that
(03:35):
you want. So you know, when you want your kids
to have the camera, you can give them the camera,
you know, Okay.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
You can control it right down to them having access
to the camera.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
And not that's right.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Yeah, so even the camera app you can control access to.
So out of the box, it comes without an internet browser,
comes without an app store, and so really just a
basic smartphone and it's got location tracking built in so
you can see you know where you where your kids
(04:06):
are going with the phone as well.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
So you as the parent from your device, you have
control over everything that they can access, everything that they
can see. Can you can you see what they are
saying to other people and who they're interacting with on
this phone as well. It's a weird sort of line
where you go, you don't want to breach your kids
trust or privacy, but you need to know who and
(04:30):
what they're talking about, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Absolutely, So we've thought really a lot about this from
a privacy, safety and security perspective, and so what the
parent gets notified about is really just key issues, so
self harm, bullying, So if there's any indicators of those things,
then that will flag up on the safe surf of dashboard.
And so you as a parent.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
On your phone, right, not on the kids phone.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
So the dashboard is on either your computer or your phone,
so it's a it's a web based sort of tool
that you that you jump into and then it automatically
will yeah, we'll basically send the updates to the phone
via Samsung Knox, which is this really awesome technology that
(05:19):
Samsung have, which is one of the most secure things,
secure ways in the world to do this.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
One thing. One thing.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
My eleven year old is surrounded by friends now that
are all getting phones, or at the start of that,
she's desperate for one, but she also knows my stance
and her mum our stance in this house is that
you don't need one right now. One big thing that
we've let her get and we really look after it
and see what's happening is Messenger Kids, which I think
(05:48):
so many kids her age now everyone's got Messenger Kids.
It's the young It's the before Instagram and giving them everything.
It's Facebook Messenger that we know four kids. We have
to accept what friend she talks to. We tell her
that we can see everything she writes, and she fully
believes that. But on this device, let's say you didn't
want to get that straight away.
Speaker 4 (06:08):
Is there a moment that you can be like, hey.
Speaker 6 (06:10):
I want to be able to access Messenger Kids and
download that onto her phone.
Speaker 4 (06:13):
Now I'm cool with that to happen.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
You can easily do that, Yeah, absolutely, So you can
add just Messenger Kids, and that's a great example, you know,
of an app which is actually genuinely safe. You know,
in the last eight years, I have not heard anyone
really speak of anything too terrible happening on Messenger Kids,
which is not something I can say for a lot
of other platforms. Yeah, so I think Messenger Kids is
(06:38):
a is a great example of something that you you
might want to add in an addition to the basic.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
So say you your kid is has their their safe
surfer phone, and you're slowly but surely adding things we
get to like the age of fifteen or whatever age
your family deems it necessary that they have things like
a web browser for example. Once you do that, is
there still a way to protect them from the total
onslaught of everything that's on the internet, Because I know
(07:06):
Jordan's talked about this one thing on the net links
to another thing on the net, protect you to another
thing on the net. So can you still give them
the Internet without giving them the full force of the Internet.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Absolutely? Yeah, So really that was kind of my driving
force before doing the phone was how to actually build
this Internet filter. So the Internet filter that safe Zepher
has has fifty to sixty categories of different content that you,
as a parent can actually pick and choose. So immediately
you know, obviously it's blocking porn, and then you know,
(07:39):
you can choose to block online gambling, you can choose
to block you know, you name it. And so some
of those categories are really really powerful categories. And yeah,
there's just a lot of really smart stuff in there,
which we've been working a really long time on and
so it's just a really awesome opportunity. I guess that
(08:00):
that Samsung have actually jumped on board and that we're
starting it in New Zealand.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
My kids are obsessed with Taylor Swift at the moment,
to the point that it is driving me insane. I'm
not saying that she needs to be blocked, but if
I needed a break, could I potentially block Taylor Swift
related searches from their phone?
Speaker 4 (08:18):
Yeah? You can.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
You could get to that level if you you chose
to do good good.
Speaker 6 (08:23):
I think that that blocklist releasing the list the blocklist
as like a social media infographic, right, I think that
would be a massive wake up call for so many
parents that think, oh it's fine, not bad parents that
his parents that don't stop to think about it.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
And my kid's been going at me here, just have
the phone.
Speaker 6 (08:42):
And it's not until you're at a we get friends
over and I'll bring it up because I am quite
passionate about no our kids not having a phone, not
for quite a while. And they will kind of roll
their eyes and I'm like, okay, so if your kid
jumps on in types and beheading video, you know within two.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
Clicks they're seeing someone be beheaded. No they're not.
Speaker 6 (08:57):
Yes, they are like, there's this goes like this for
a second and covers their eyes and covers their ears
and thinks and forgetting type on the internet is there
within two clicks? And you're giving that to an eleven
year old Like that is some mental scarring that will
not leave your cad for a very long time.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
So yeah, this is this is I am I'm all for.
Speaker 6 (09:18):
I told my wife what I was coming to talk
about right now, and she's like, oh, this could be
great for Mela. We could finally get an off go
back if we can get a safe, smart not a
dumb phone.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
And phonus is like a modern Samsung. It's a cool phone, you.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Know, it's a really impressive piece of tech, you know.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
Yeah, so it looks exactly like my phone.
Speaker 6 (09:37):
He showed it to camera now and it looks like
a regular, regular, beautiful Samsung.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
But look at that, like there's there's just nothing on it,
you know, it's cools and texts.
Speaker 6 (09:46):
I mean the camera things. The camera things pretty clever too,
because again, I have extended family who innocently their nine
and ten year old have a TikTok that they love
to do the dancers for And I'm like, this is
all great, but do you know who's watch the books
from the other side.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Of the world.
Speaker 6 (10:02):
Yeah know, well, creepy uncle Kevin from Bloody America is
watching ten year old starts. And you think it's innocent,
and you think only your friends and family are watching,
But the whole world can see these videos.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
So oh, it's absolutely a massive issue. And I think,
you know, you really hit on. And I'm just as
passionate as you are and have been for a long time.
And I think the issue that I've noticed is that
the safety hasn't been built in by design, so from
the heart of the products that we're actually building. Safety
hasn't been there and so it's always added as an afterthought.
(10:38):
And so again that's why this is a really great
solution because it's actually safety built into the heart and
design of the phone. So all of those platforms that
you're talking about are just huge red flags, you know, TikTok,
because they just have not really taken safety that it's
almost like they don't have parents, you know, looking for teenagers. Yeah, yeah,
(11:03):
it's really weird, but they and they come out with
some great announcements, but it's still not you know, not there.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
So yeah, so talk about how you would get something
like this onto your kid's bone. I know that we
have partnered with Samsung to give away a new Samsung
smartphone that has a Safe Surfer subscription and that a
subscription model on it.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
That's how it works as well.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Yeah, so you can buy the phone from the Safe
Surfer shop or from the Samsung online store, So you
can go and you can go right now and you
can go and buy one of these, yeah, for three
ninety nine. That's the starter. That's the A fifteen, which
as I say, is a really really awesome device and
(11:46):
it will come with a year's with a subscription to
safe Surfer, and then after that year you're then going
to be either paying one hundred and twenty nine dollars
for the pro or fifty four dollars for the basic,
which is just that kind of cause and texts that
really basic profile. The really cool thing is that Safe
(12:09):
Surfer is a social enterprise and so really we're just
trying to make this affordable for families. Yeah, you know,
our whole mission is how to protect young people online
and their mental health. And so Samsung have really come
to the party with this and they are going to
give five percent of the profits of these phones to
kids in to the Safe steff of Charitable Trust in
(12:31):
order to give phones to kids in vulnerable situations, so
that they're going to have phones which are safe, you know,
but also that they actually get a phone. So Samsung's
been doing a lot of work in this digital equity
space in the Islands where you just came back from
Jordan and yeah, and so it's really awesome that this
generosity is starting to happen here in New Zealand as well.
Speaker 6 (12:54):
I want to know, when you know your kids in
bed and you're like, all right, off your phone now
and they're like click lock and put it next to
their bed. Is there a way that you can fully
control like the hours that they can access certain things
on the phone, or can you shut it down your phone?
Speaker 4 (13:10):
Or how does like a sleep schedule or yeah, that's
also just.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
To stop them from getting addicted to this thing as well,
like unlimited amount of time on the device.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Yeah, absolutely, So there's there's some really cool technology built
in around the scheduling and just instantly the apps will
gray out, you know, as you as you do the schedule,
and so you'll notice that. But I think, you know,
it's really about how do we honor our kids time
and attention, you know, which is what's not happening currently,
(13:43):
and and they're just constantly being distracted and pulled away
and so really it's it's kind of a bit of
an arms race. But this is a great tool to
be able to stop that and to be able to
actually help them to self navigate and self monitor or
moderate their own usage, you know, because I believe that's
(14:03):
kind of the future is actually educating, providing enough education
before they get the devices, so when they get the devices,
they are only getting it you know, maybe in smaller
quantities and things like that, and then they're actually learning
to self moderate themselves.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
It's fantastic. It's exactly what we've all been wanting for
our kids when it comes to technology. So good on
you guys for working so hard to get something like
this out there. And I know, Jordan, you specifically have
kids who are probably ready for it right now, right.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
Yes, yeah, we have an eleven year old who is itching.
Speaker 6 (14:40):
But it's funny every parent will face this where we
got the eleven year old Messenger kids, and then straight
away her nine year old sister's like, why can't I
have a Messenger kids?
Speaker 4 (14:48):
Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, that's not how it works.
She's trying it on.
Speaker 6 (14:52):
But yeah, we're close to like, we'll definitely look look
at this much closer and see because still I'm like,
I get it's but I think you can maybe wait
till twelve and then.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
Yeah, get it like you do.
Speaker 6 (15:04):
You don't have too much going on, You don't have
a lot of weird netble practices where we need to
be contacting you like there during school hours.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
But this will definitely be the point that we'll start.
Speaker 6 (15:14):
I love that your argument against because my rant originally
was about get a dumb phone, dumb phone, but this
you make sense at dumb phone is like that they've
been used to playing iPad games at home.
Speaker 4 (15:26):
They've touched our phones and they know what that's like.
Speaker 6 (15:28):
And then you're like, no, go back to the cave
and tap on these click buttons. So you've made a
dumb phone call and looks like and look like a
regular phone. So I think that if you get your
kids these, they're not going to be rolling their eyes
and being like this is lame, I hate you? And
what is this thing? Is it for keeping the door closed?
This is a doorstop? Is this is what you've given me?
(15:48):
This brick phones?
Speaker 4 (15:49):
Brick? Yeah? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
I'll give you a really great tip as well that
I picked up, and that's you don't necessarily give them
a phone. You can say to them, this is a
family phone or a family device that you can use,
but it's still mine. So in my case, you know,
as a dad, I don't think i'll ever say to
my kid.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
This is your phone.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
They have ownership of it, so it's it's almost just like, hey,
here's a family phone. It's going to circulate.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
It's not your phone. It's the phone.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
Yeah, and when you go to football practice or whatever,
you know, then you can take the family phone with
you and then you can bring it back.
Speaker 4 (16:29):
Mate. That's that's amazing. That's a great hack. That's an
awesome hack. Yeah, we're going to clip that. That'll be
a bloody good, little good little clip there. That's a
great tip. You should. You should start a parenting podcast.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
The last thing I was going to ask you is,
I think a lot of parents are terrified of how
tech savvy kids are in comparison to themselves.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
We're sort of right on the edge of that generation
who knows about this stuff.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
But if you're slightly less connected or even slightly older,
the great bear is that the kid's going to be
smarter than you, and they're going to hack whatever locks
that you put on this phone. Is this safe sever
thing largely unhackable for a kid.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
It's it's legit, Like, honestly, this is completely tamper proof.
You can't even hard reset the phone without going into
the dashboard.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
So like, and that's the that's kind of the beauty
of Safe Surf and Samsung coming together. And I've known
about how good this particular Samsung Knox Technology is for
a number of years and so it's it's just awesome
to be able to get to this point and go
here it is parents.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, brilliant. Okay, well, Rory, we appreciate your time and
thanks for the insights. If parents are still trying to
digest how all of this stuff works and where to
buy the products from, where's the best place for.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Them to go and check it all out.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
Kid's Safe Phone dot NZ. So that's the that's the
page that we've got set up specifically that talks about
the Kid's Safe smart phone. As I say, it's not
just the phone. There's a range of tablets as well.
You're awesome for education and so yeah, go go and
grab those.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Awesome cheers Worried, Thanks Matte, thanks allent.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
Jordan.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Yeah m m hm
Today we're talking to Rory Birkbeck. He's a dad. He's
the founder and CEO of Safe Surfer.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
They've teamed up with Samsung New Zealand to launch a
kid safe Smartphonekday.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Rory, Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Hey Clint, Hey Jordan. How are you guys doing.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
I'm good mate, I'm fizzed.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (00:22):
Now, I don't know if you've gone through the back catalog, Rory,
but listeners out there that may have heard many months ago,
I'm very passionate about banning kids, stopping kids, holding young
kids getting phones in their hands when they are not
ready for them, full on smartphones.
Speaker 6 (00:38):
I just don't think a nine to ten eleven year
old should be able to access anything they want on
the internet. I'm super passionate about this. We've talked about
this in the podcast. It was one of our most
successful video raps that I did. So super keen to
talk to you today and what you're all about. So
start off with what is Safe Surfer?
Speaker 3 (00:57):
Yeah, so about eight years ago, as a dad, I
kind of embarked on a journey to protect our kids
and a friend to his kids, and yeah, it just
kind of led me to just figuring out that this
online safety world or the online world is just crazy.
Speaker 6 (01:14):
You know.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
It's kind of like the Parenting Hangover part two, I
feel like, or two point zero, where it's just yeah,
just the stuff that's out there is just so random,
so nuts, and we've been seeing it for so long,
but I think people are finally starting to realize. So,
like you were saying, you know, Safe Surfer really we
(01:37):
build online safety tech products. So we've kind of embarked
on like I'm a tech person and so basically we've
kind of built a whole bunch of really cool tech
and that's that's sort of been our journey with safe
Surfer and really excited today to be able to announce
that we are launching this Kid's Safe smartphone with Samsung.
(01:58):
So just a really awesome part partnership that has kind
of come together again just to build really the ultimate
tech armory for parents to be able to navigate the space.
As you're saying, you know, like there's a real need
to delay smartphones and delay particularly social media and apps,
(02:19):
and so kids are just getting just what they need
from our tech without getting too much too soon.
Speaker 4 (02:26):
Because what age do you find that currently what age
on average, are kids getting a smartphone?
Speaker 3 (02:32):
Yeah, so there's there's stats out there that about eighty
percent of kids have smartphones by the time there are
eleven wo wow, and that. Yeah, that just shows you
kind of the collective trap that parents have caught into.
And so look, I think the answer is that we
(02:53):
can't go can't go backwards with like dumb phones, like
I've tried to use a dumb phone myself in the past,
and the technology like we're just used to the custom
keyboards and the real smart stuff, you know. And so
I think what we need is actually because kids do
need phones, you know, they need to be in touch
with their parents and things like that. So what we
(03:13):
actually need is exactly what we've just built with Samsung,
which is just this calls and texts smartphone which is
fully robust, fully tamper proof so they can't get round it,
you know. And then yeah, you're able to kind of
give that to them, and then as they grow and mature,
you're able to step up and add the features that
(03:35):
you want. So you know, when you want your kids
to have the camera, you can give them the camera,
you know, Okay.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
You can control it right down to them having access
to the camera.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
And not that's right.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Yeah, so even the camera app you can control access to.
So out of the box, it comes without an internet browser,
comes without an app store, and so really just a
basic smartphone and it's got location tracking built in so
you can see you know where you where your kids
(04:06):
are going with the phone as well.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
So you as the parent from your device, you have
control over everything that they can access, everything that they
can see. Can you can you see what they are
saying to other people and who they're interacting with on
this phone as well. It's a weird sort of line
where you go, you don't want to breach your kids
trust or privacy, but you need to know who and
(04:30):
what they're talking about, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Absolutely, So we've thought really a lot about this from
a privacy, safety and security perspective, and so what the
parent gets notified about is really just key issues, so
self harm, bullying, So if there's any indicators of those things,
then that will flag up on the safe surf of dashboard.
And so you as a parent.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
On your phone, right, not on the kids phone.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
So the dashboard is on either your computer or your phone,
so it's a it's a web based sort of tool
that you that you jump into and then it automatically
will yeah, we'll basically send the updates to the phone
via Samsung Knox, which is this really awesome technology that
(05:19):
Samsung have, which is one of the most secure things,
secure ways in the world to do this.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
One thing. One thing.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
My eleven year old is surrounded by friends now that
are all getting phones, or at the start of that,
she's desperate for one, but she also knows my stance
and her mum our stance in this house is that
you don't need one right now. One big thing that
we've let her get and we really look after it
and see what's happening is Messenger Kids, which I think
(05:48):
so many kids her age now everyone's got Messenger Kids.
It's the young It's the before Instagram and giving them everything.
It's Facebook Messenger that we know four kids. We have
to accept what friend she talks to. We tell her
that we can see everything she writes, and she fully
believes that. But on this device, let's say you didn't
want to get that straight away.
Speaker 4 (06:08):
Is there a moment that you can be like, hey.
Speaker 6 (06:10):
I want to be able to access Messenger Kids and
download that onto her phone.
Speaker 4 (06:13):
Now I'm cool with that to happen.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
You can easily do that, Yeah, absolutely, So you can
add just Messenger Kids, and that's a great example, you know,
of an app which is actually genuinely safe. You know,
in the last eight years, I have not heard anyone
really speak of anything too terrible happening on Messenger Kids,
which is not something I can say for a lot
of other platforms. Yeah, so I think Messenger Kids is
(06:38):
a is a great example of something that you you
might want to add in an addition to the basic.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
So say you your kid is has their their safe
surfer phone, and you're slowly but surely adding things we
get to like the age of fifteen or whatever age
your family deems it necessary that they have things like
a web browser for example. Once you do that, is
there still a way to protect them from the total
onslaught of everything that's on the internet, Because I know
(07:06):
Jordan's talked about this one thing on the net links
to another thing on the net, protect you to another
thing on the net. So can you still give them
the Internet without giving them the full force of the Internet.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Absolutely? Yeah, So really that was kind of my driving
force before doing the phone was how to actually build
this Internet filter. So the Internet filter that safe Zepher
has has fifty to sixty categories of different content that you,
as a parent can actually pick and choose. So immediately
you know, obviously it's blocking porn, and then you know,
(07:39):
you can choose to block online gambling, you can choose
to block you know, you name it. And so some
of those categories are really really powerful categories. And yeah,
there's just a lot of really smart stuff in there,
which we've been working a really long time on and
so it's just a really awesome opportunity. I guess that
(08:00):
that Samsung have actually jumped on board and that we're
starting it in New Zealand.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
My kids are obsessed with Taylor Swift at the moment,
to the point that it is driving me insane. I'm
not saying that she needs to be blocked, but if
I needed a break, could I potentially block Taylor Swift
related searches from their phone?
Speaker 4 (08:18):
Yeah? You can.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
You could get to that level if you you chose
to do good good.
Speaker 6 (08:23):
I think that that blocklist releasing the list the blocklist
as like a social media infographic, right, I think that
would be a massive wake up call for so many
parents that think, oh it's fine, not bad parents that
his parents that don't stop to think about it.
Speaker 4 (08:39):
And my kid's been going at me here, just have
the phone.
Speaker 6 (08:42):
And it's not until you're at a we get friends
over and I'll bring it up because I am quite
passionate about no our kids not having a phone, not
for quite a while. And they will kind of roll
their eyes and I'm like, okay, so if your kid
jumps on in types and beheading video, you know within two.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
Clicks they're seeing someone be beheaded. No they're not.
Speaker 6 (08:57):
Yes, they are like, there's this goes like this for
a second and covers their eyes and covers their ears
and thinks and forgetting type on the internet is there
within two clicks? And you're giving that to an eleven
year old Like that is some mental scarring that will
not leave your cad for a very long time.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
So yeah, this is this is I am I'm all for.
Speaker 6 (09:18):
I told my wife what I was coming to talk
about right now, and she's like, oh, this could be
great for Mela. We could finally get an off go
back if we can get a safe, smart not a
dumb phone.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
And phonus is like a modern Samsung. It's a cool phone, you.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Know, it's a really impressive piece of tech, you know.
Speaker 1 (09:35):
Yeah, so it looks exactly like my phone.
Speaker 6 (09:37):
He showed it to camera now and it looks like
a regular, regular, beautiful Samsung.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
But look at that, like there's there's just nothing on it,
you know, it's cools and texts.
Speaker 6 (09:46):
I mean the camera things. The camera things pretty clever too,
because again, I have extended family who innocently their nine
and ten year old have a TikTok that they love
to do the dancers for And I'm like, this is
all great, but do you know who's watch the books
from the other side.
Speaker 4 (10:01):
Of the world.
Speaker 6 (10:02):
Yeah know, well, creepy uncle Kevin from Bloody America is
watching ten year old starts. And you think it's innocent,
and you think only your friends and family are watching,
But the whole world can see these videos.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
So oh, it's absolutely a massive issue. And I think,
you know, you really hit on. And I'm just as
passionate as you are and have been for a long time.
And I think the issue that I've noticed is that
the safety hasn't been built in by design, so from
the heart of the products that we're actually building. Safety
hasn't been there and so it's always added as an afterthought.
(10:38):
And so again that's why this is a really great
solution because it's actually safety built into the heart and
design of the phone. So all of those platforms that
you're talking about are just huge red flags, you know, TikTok,
because they just have not really taken safety that it's
almost like they don't have parents, you know, looking for teenagers. Yeah, yeah,
(11:03):
it's really weird, but they and they come out with
some great announcements, but it's still not you know, not there.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
So yeah, so talk about how you would get something
like this onto your kid's bone. I know that we
have partnered with Samsung to give away a new Samsung
smartphone that has a Safe Surfer subscription and that a
subscription model on it.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
That's how it works as well.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Yeah, so you can buy the phone from the Safe
Surfer shop or from the Samsung online store, So you
can go and you can go right now and you
can go and buy one of these, yeah, for three
ninety nine. That's the starter. That's the A fifteen, which
as I say, is a really really awesome device and
(11:46):
it will come with a year's with a subscription to
safe Surfer, and then after that year you're then going
to be either paying one hundred and twenty nine dollars
for the pro or fifty four dollars for the basic,
which is just that kind of cause and texts that
really basic profile. The really cool thing is that Safe
(12:09):
Surfer is a social enterprise and so really we're just
trying to make this affordable for families. Yeah, you know,
our whole mission is how to protect young people online
and their mental health. And so Samsung have really come
to the party with this and they are going to
give five percent of the profits of these phones to
kids in to the Safe steff of Charitable Trust in
(12:31):
order to give phones to kids in vulnerable situations, so
that they're going to have phones which are safe, you know,
but also that they actually get a phone. So Samsung's
been doing a lot of work in this digital equity
space in the Islands where you just came back from
Jordan and yeah, and so it's really awesome that this
generosity is starting to happen here in New Zealand as well.
Speaker 6 (12:54):
I want to know, when you know your kids in
bed and you're like, all right, off your phone now
and they're like click lock and put it next to
their bed. Is there a way that you can fully
control like the hours that they can access certain things
on the phone, or can you shut it down your phone?
Speaker 4 (13:10):
Or how does like a sleep schedule or yeah, that's
also just.
Speaker 1 (13:14):
To stop them from getting addicted to this thing as well,
like unlimited amount of time on the device.
Speaker 3 (13:19):
Yeah, absolutely, So there's there's some really cool technology built
in around the scheduling and just instantly the apps will
gray out, you know, as you as you do the schedule,
and so you'll notice that. But I think, you know,
it's really about how do we honor our kids time
and attention, you know, which is what's not happening currently,
(13:43):
and and they're just constantly being distracted and pulled away
and so really it's it's kind of a bit of
an arms race. But this is a great tool to
be able to stop that and to be able to
actually help them to self navigate and self monitor or
moderate their own usage, you know, because I believe that's
(14:03):
kind of the future is actually educating, providing enough education
before they get the devices, so when they get the devices,
they are only getting it you know, maybe in smaller
quantities and things like that, and then they're actually learning
to self moderate themselves.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
It's fantastic. It's exactly what we've all been wanting for
our kids when it comes to technology. So good on
you guys for working so hard to get something like
this out there. And I know, Jordan, you specifically have
kids who are probably ready for it right now, right.
Speaker 4 (14:36):
Yes, yeah, we have an eleven year old who is itching.
Speaker 6 (14:40):
But it's funny every parent will face this where we
got the eleven year old Messenger kids, and then straight
away her nine year old sister's like, why can't I
have a Messenger kids?
Speaker 4 (14:48):
Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, that's not how it works.
She's trying it on.
Speaker 6 (14:52):
But yeah, we're close to like, we'll definitely look look
at this much closer and see because still I'm like,
I get it's but I think you can maybe wait
till twelve and then.
Speaker 4 (15:03):
Yeah, get it like you do.
Speaker 6 (15:04):
You don't have too much going on, You don't have
a lot of weird netble practices where we need to
be contacting you like there during school hours.
Speaker 4 (15:11):
But this will definitely be the point that we'll start.
Speaker 6 (15:14):
I love that your argument against because my rant originally
was about get a dumb phone, dumb phone, but this
you make sense at dumb phone is like that they've
been used to playing iPad games at home.
Speaker 4 (15:26):
They've touched our phones and they know what that's like.
Speaker 6 (15:28):
And then you're like, no, go back to the cave
and tap on these click buttons. So you've made a
dumb phone call and looks like and look like a
regular phone. So I think that if you get your
kids these, they're not going to be rolling their eyes
and being like this is lame, I hate you? And
what is this thing? Is it for keeping the door closed?
This is a doorstop? Is this is what you've given me?
(15:48):
This brick phones?
Speaker 4 (15:49):
Brick? Yeah? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
I'll give you a really great tip as well that
I picked up, and that's you don't necessarily give them
a phone. You can say to them, this is a
family phone or a family device that you can use,
but it's still mine. So in my case, you know,
as a dad, I don't think i'll ever say to
my kid.
Speaker 4 (16:09):
This is your phone.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
They have ownership of it, so it's it's almost just like, hey,
here's a family phone. It's going to circulate.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
It's not your phone. It's the phone.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
Yeah, and when you go to football practice or whatever,
you know, then you can take the family phone with
you and then you can bring it back.
Speaker 4 (16:29):
Mate. That's that's amazing. That's a great hack. That's an
awesome hack. Yeah, we're going to clip that. That'll be
a bloody good, little good little clip there. That's a
great tip. You should. You should start a parenting podcast.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
The last thing I was going to ask you is,
I think a lot of parents are terrified of how
tech savvy kids are in comparison to themselves.
Speaker 1 (16:51):
We're sort of right on the edge of that generation
who knows about this stuff.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
But if you're slightly less connected or even slightly older,
the great bear is that the kid's going to be
smarter than you, and they're going to hack whatever locks
that you put on this phone. Is this safe sever
thing largely unhackable for a kid.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
It's it's legit, Like, honestly, this is completely tamper proof.
You can't even hard reset the phone without going into
the dashboard.
Speaker 4 (17:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
So like, and that's the that's kind of the beauty
of Safe Surf and Samsung coming together. And I've known
about how good this particular Samsung Knox Technology is for
a number of years and so it's it's just awesome
to be able to get to this point and go
here it is parents.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, brilliant. Okay, well, Rory, we appreciate your time and
thanks for the insights. If parents are still trying to
digest how all of this stuff works and where to
buy the products from, where's the best place for.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Them to go and check it all out.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
Kid's Safe Phone dot NZ. So that's the that's the
page that we've got set up specifically that talks about
the Kid's Safe smart phone. As I say, it's not
just the phone. There's a range of tablets as well.
You're awesome for education and so yeah, go go and
grab those.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Awesome cheers Worried, Thanks Matte, thanks allent.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
Jordan.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Yeah m m hm
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