Parenting in a Tech World

Behind every Bark Phone, Watch, Home, or Sync that arrives on your doorstep, there's a team of real people, not robots, who packed it by hand. In this episode, you'll meet the humans responsible for making sure your child's safety device gets to your family the right way. Shari manages Bark's distribution center in Utah, and Crystal is the operations support specialist who keeps daily operations r...

Online predators are actively targeting your kids right now, and two Michigan men decided they couldn't wait for the system to act. Jake Hockey and C.J. of Pred Task Force built a team that runs undercover stings, with decoys posing as minors on dating apps, confronting suspects on camera, and calling law enforcement when the time is right. Jake and C.J. are citizen investigators who have grown Pr...

The invisible mental load of early parenthood — tracking feeds, monitoring sleep, anticipating every need — is one of the most exhausting and least-talked-about realities of having a baby. Nanit's latest parent report pulls back the curtain on what's actually happening in homes across the country during those first overwhelming years. Victoria Vaynberg is the Chief Customer and Marketing Officer a...

Financial sextortion is targeting teenage boys at an alarming rate — and most families have never heard of it until it's too late. In 2022, 17-year-old Gavin Guffey fell victim to an online blackmail scam and died by suicide. His father, South Carolina State Representative Brandon Guffey, refused to let Gavin's death be the end of the story. Rep. Guffey is one of the driving forces behind Gavin's...

Diane Tarantini is a survivor, author, and body safety educator whose work is bringing one of the most underreported forms of child sexual abuse into the open. In this episode, she shares the story behind her children's book The Brave Knight — which teaches kids to recognize grooming and speak up — her memoir Everyone Was Silent, and why child-on-child sexual abuse is being called America's silent...

Jen Davidson spent years raising two kids with a simple but powerful ritual — intentional conversations she called Life Lesson Lunches — and her grown children loved it so much they asked her to write it all down so they could use it someday as parents themselves. In her book Keep Talking, Jen offers a warm, practical roadmap for staying connected with kids even when they're doing everything to pu...

What does it actually feel like to be the kid on the other side of all that well-intentioned parenting technology? Audra and Savanna grew up navigating learning challenges with tools, apps, and monitoring software shaping their daily lives — and they're here to tell the truth about what helped, what felt like a leash, and what they wish the adults in their lives had done differently. If you've eve...

Heisman Trophy winner and Tim Tebow Foundation founder Tim Tebow has spent years on the front lines of fighting child sexual exploitation — and what he's seen should be on every parent's radar. In this episode, Tim breaks down the online predators hiding in the apps and platforms your kids use every day, what it took to pass landmark federal legislation protecting children online, and the real lin...

Catherine Price is an award-winning health and science journalist, #1 New York Times bestselling author, and founder of Screen/Life Balance — and she's here to cut through the overwhelm parents feel around phones and screens. In this episode, Catherine shares what actually works for families trying to reclaim balance, including insights from her newly revised How to Break Up With Your Phone and he...

Nicole Guysi is a Family Transition Navigator at Encircle Families — Arizona's federally funded Parent Training and Information Center — but she's also a parent who has lived the reality of raising a child with a rare diagnosis and figuring out the role technology needs to play in their life. In this episode, Nicole shares what that journey actually looked like: the searching, the gaps, the wins,...

Dr. Alison Yeung is a family physician and mom of two who built a community of 125,000+ followers after spending a decade watching adolescent mental health visits climb in her practice — and connecting the dots back to smartphones and social media. In this episode, she breaks down what the research actually shows about screens and kids' developing brains, why Big Tech deserves more scrutiny than p...

Laura Marquez-Garrett left a two-decade Big Law career to become one of the most powerful legal voices fighting for kids harmed by social media — and in March 2026, they helped make history. As counsel of record in the first-ever trial to hold Meta and YouTube liable for harming a child through addictive platform design, Laura joins us to break down what the $6 million verdict actually means, what...

Chris Tiffany brings a rare dual perspective to his role as Executive Director of Encircle Families — he's both a former special education teacher and a parent of a child with autism. In this episode, Chris shares what his statewide Arizona organization is seeing on the ground when it comes to students with intellectual and developmental disabilities and their access to technology. You'll walk awa...

James Billig is Chief Compliance Officer at U-ACT (United Against Child Trafficking), a nonprofit equipping law enforcement and communities to fight online exploitation. He shares what officers are seeing on the front lines, how U-ACT's Blue Taskforce is training retired law enforcement to combat child trafficking, and the red flags parents need to watch for as predators evolve their tactics onlin...

Dr. Carrie Mackensen is a clinical psychologist, parent coach, and founder of Successful Parent. With 25 years of experience and two boys of her own, she blends neuroscience and attachment theory to help families set healthy tech boundaries. She shares why screens flood kids' brains with dopamine, what happened when her own son secretly played video games during class, and the first step overwhelm...

Juliette Blake, founder and CEO of Moxies, has been building for girls since she was 16. Now, as a millennial mom of three, she's created a safe-by-design social platform exclusively for tween girls ages 8 to 12. She shares why 60% of teen girls experience persistent sadness, what happens when girls use platforms not built for them, and how Moxies is offering a healthier entry point into digital l...

Large gatherings of hundreds of teens are popping up in cities across the country — organized almost entirely through social media — and they're raising serious concerns for parents and communities alike. In this episode, we break down what teen takeovers actually are, what's drawing kids to them, and how quickly they can turn dangerous. If your teen is on social media, this is one trend you can't...

Kelly Stonelake spent nearly 15 years at Meta — rising to Director of Product Marketing and a senior role on Horizon Worlds — before becoming one of the most prominent whistleblowers in the fight for kids' online safety. She walked away from millions in unvested stock rather than sign an agreement protecting Meta from accountability, and has since testified before the FTC, the Washington State Sen...

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr has made child safety a cornerstone of his work—from creating the state's first Human Trafficking Prosecution Unit, which has rescued over 200 children, to launching investigations into platforms like Roblox for child exploitation. He shares what prompted the Roblox investigation, details from a recent conviction involving grooming on Snapchat, and what parents...

Bark's 2025 Annual Report analyzed a record 11.1 billion online activities—and the findings reveal a troubling paradox. While predator alerts in monitored spaces dropped 60%, national sextortion cases are surging. The danger hasn't disappeared; it's just moved where parents can't see it. We break down the biggest risks facing kids today, from the 650% spike in disordered eating content among tween...

Dr. Jean Twenge, psychologist and author of 10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World, has spent decades studying how technology is reshaping childhood. Her research provided some of the earliest evidence linking smartphones and social media to rising rates of teen depression and anxiety. She shares the 'aha' moments from her work, what the data really shows about teens and tech, and the rule...

Melissa McKay, president of the Digital Childhood Institute, made headlines when her viral post forced Google to reverse its policy of emailing kids instructions to remove parental controls at age 13. She shares the story behind that win, why Roblox is doing the same thing, and what parents need to know about protecting their kids when tech companies prioritize profit over safety. Learn more about...

Selma Blair gets candid about parenting her 14-year-old son in an always-connected world. She shares how she's navigated tech and social media as both a public figure and a mom, the conversations she's had about online safety, and her advice for parents trying to find balance in a digital age.

Paul Raffile is a cybercrime expert and online safety advocate who's been on the front lines of catching sextortion scammers and exposing platform failures. He shares what parents need to know about sextortion, which apps pose the biggest risks, and the shocking reality of what social media companies allow to happen on their platforms. Connect with Paul on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raf...

Dr. Nidhi Gupta — physician, author of Calm the Noise, and founder of the Phreedom Foundation — breaks down how tech is impacting our health and what families can do to take back control. She shares the science behind constant notifications, her 'aha' moment that led to writing the book, and the three rules every family should start with tonight. Learn more about Dr. Gupta and the Phreedom Foundat...