Parents can read children’s internet chats, court rules

A SPANISH court has cleared a divorced father who was accused of breaching his nine-year-old daughter’s right to privacy by reading Whatsapp messages between her and her mother.

The child’s mother had sued her former partner in the northern city of Pontevedra, but the judge said parents’ responsibility to monitor children’s internet use outweighed any invasion of privacy in a ruling that may set a precedent for underage social media use.

The man was allowed by his daughter to read her Whatsapp chats together, proving that there was no intent to “discover secrets or infringe on the person’s privacy without permission”.