Like everyone else in 2020, Grant Khanbalinov downloaded Tik Tok. He wasn’t trying to learn dances or find a community- he wanted to learn the platform for his marketing job. To practice using the app, he made videos with his wife and kids. Then a video of his three-year-old daughter went viral, and Grant’s account blew up. He gained millions of followers and eventually made hundreds of thousands of dollars from his videos. It all felt like a dream, until…one night he realized there is a dark side to sharing his kids online.

You can follow Grant on Tik Tok @heyelliamfamily. 

This week’s bonus episode on TTFA Premium is an interview with Sarah Adams (@mom.uncharted), an advocate for children’s privacy online, and Chris McCarty, a 19-year-old who is working to make policy changes to protect the children of influencers. 

Follow our other show, The Terrible Reading Club, to get an upcoming episode featuring Nora and friend of the pod Kate Kennedy, and their conversation around books that explore this idea of “sharenting”. 

If you want to learn more about sharenting and putting kids on social media, check out these resources: 

Surgeon General report on social media’s effects on teens

YouTubers Myka and James Stauffer shared every step of their adoption process. Until the last via The Cut

A Child’s Tik Tok Stardom Opens Doors. Then A Gunman Arrives via New York Times.

18-year-old sues her parents for sharing childhood photos

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The episode transcript can be found here.

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