Meta has announced that it will be rolling out new parenting management tools to its Quest line of VR headsets in the coming months. It’s supposed to start in April 2022. They want to expand their unlocking mechanisms to allow parents to block certain content for their kids. From May 2022, teenagers will also be automatically blocked from buying or downloading apps that are not suitable for their age.
Let’s get back to the unlock patterns that you can set on the quest. From April you can then create a specific template that must be used for specific apps in order to unlock them. As far as the purchase and the downloads are concerned: Automatically you want to keep to the specifications of the International Age Rating Coalition. However, parents will of course be free to remove these restrictions if they feel their children are mature enough for specific apps. Teens can also make requests to their parents for clearance. Parents can then approve or reject this.
The parent dashboard will be accessible through the Oculus app. Parents can also link their children’s accounts there. Both the parents and the teenagers have to agree to this. Parents can also see all the apps their teenagers have there and receive notifications when a new app has been purchased. The screen time of the VR glasses can also be viewed – this also applies to the Oculus friends list. Parents can also block the Link or Air Link so the teens cannot access PC content on the Quest.
Meta also reminds here that the Quest models are suitable for children/teenagers from the age of 13. The new parenting functions are therefore also aimed at families with children of this age. Younger family members should not use VR headsets at all.