You call your child – no answer. You try again – it goes to voicemail. You send him or her a text message – still no reply. If this seems like a normal interaction with your wayward teenager, help is at hand. Sharon Standifird, a Texas mother of two, has developed an app called Ignore No More for Android phones, allowing parents to lock their children’s phones from a separate device. The child has to return their parent’s call before the phone is usable again.
According to the application’s website, that means “no calls to friends, no text, no games ... until they call you back”. Trying to remove the app causes the phone to lock – a process that can only be reversed by the parent. It’s no surprise that Ignore No More has been a hit with the parents who have purchased it, but not so much with their children.
It all sounds a bit too good to be true. And perhaps it is. Surely, with today’s tech-savvy children it’s only a matter of time before the app is cracked.
In the meantime, it might be worth considering why you are so keen to hear your offspring’s voice. Is it because you love them and worry when they’re not around, or because you don’t trust them? If it’s the latter, then sadly, there’s no app to fix that.
