“Momfluencers” and the Perils of “Sharenting”: At What Cost? | Disha

Abstract

The rise of social media has led to a phenomenon called "sharenting," where parents, particularly mothers, share intimate moments of their children’s lives online. In India, this practice has gained prominence with the increasing popularity of "momfluencers" who use their children to enhance their social media presence. While documenting children’s lives may seem harmless, it raises significant privacy and security concerns, especially with the advent of artificial intelligence (AI). AI technologies can manipulate publicly shared images to create explicit content, making children vulnerable to exploitation. This article examines the ethical dilemmas and security risks associated with sharenting in India, focusing on the role of momfluencers and the legal inadequacies that fail to protect children from unintended exposure. It highlights the growing threat of AI-generated child pornography and the dangers of sharing children’s images online. The article urges parents to exercise caution and responsibility, suggesting that the drive for social media engagement should not come at the cost of a child’s privacy and security. Ultimately, the paper calls for greater awareness and vigilance in the digital age.

KeywordsSharenting, Momfluencers, Child Exploitation, Artificial Intelligence, Online Privacy Risks

Introduction

With the advent of social media, it is now common practice to post fragments of our lives online. There are such platforms as Instagram, Facebook and TikTok where users are encouraged to share images and short videos with their friends about their daily activities. Nevertheless, the line between the acceptable sharing of content on social media, especially about children and privacy has been put into questioning. This sharing of a child’s life in the form of photos and videos on the web is termed as sharenting; and it is one of the new and worrisome parenting styles. As innocent as sharenting sounds, there is an alarming underbelly to it especially in India given the tremendous growth of social media. The growth of social media and technology, particularly Artificial Intelligence (AI), has made sharenting a problem.

The Origin of the Term “Sharenting”

The word ‘sharenting,’ which is made up of ‘sharing’ and ‘parenting,’ came into use in the early 2010’s. Its rise occurred alongside the rise to prominence of social networks as the main vehicles through which people shared their everyday lives, and especially the content around children. The first instance of the term came was by The Wall Street Journal in 2013, which discussed the child as a sharing tool and discusses the concerns related to the excessive sharing of children. What was once considered harmless sharing has now become a trend filled with ethical questions and security concerns, especially in the digital age where the content shared today can have long-term implications for a child’s future.

Sharenting in the Indian Context

In India, sharenting has taken on a different life. With the rise of social media influencers and content creators, many young parents—especially mothers—are using their children as central figures in their online personas. This is often seen in the growing "momfluencer" community, where mothers post about their parenting journeys, using their infants or young children as the focal point. While this might seem like an innocent way to document their parenting experiences and connect with other moms, it poses significant risks.

With over 500 million people accessing the internet, India is rapidly embracing the digital space. Social networking is flourishing particularly with the rising influencer Dynamics. First time mothers, in a bid to use platforms for validation, tend to utilise their babies for content creation. What many fail to realise is that the unfiltered exposure of their children online, especially without strong privacy settings, could serve as a breeding ground for more dangerous threats. The naive joy of posting cute moments might be opening doors for darker purposes, including child exploitation.

The Rise of AI and the Threat of Child Pornography

In recent years, especially due to the advancement of artificial intelligence, the risks associated with sharenting have increased. AI tools can easily take publicly shared images of children and manipulate them to create inappropriate or sexually explicit content. That is when sharenting turns into not only a breach of privacy but a problem of security as well. Child pornography, once difficult to access and circulate, has become frighteningly easy to create and distribute due to the capabilities of AI.

Before, acquiring explicit content involving children warranted either personal access to children or an active presence in illegal circles. But with the rise of AI, paedophiles and criminals can simply take normal looking pictures online to create synthetically composite imagery. What might begin as a well-meaning post of a child’s birthday or family outing can become a tool for malicious actors who have access to advanced image-editing tools and deepfakes. Sharenting feeds this new market for AI-generated child pornography, making it even easier for predators to exploit children.

The Role of “Momfluencers” and the Problem of Content Creation

The rise of momfluencers has brought attention to a more troubling aspect of sharenting. In what many call the “mom era” on social media, new mothers use their children, often infants, to gain followers, increase engagement, and build their online brand. Some mothers, out of a desire to connect with other mothers or share their experiences, tend to post on their social media handles. Other mothers go overboard and use their children as the centre of content they post.

For these influencers, their children are often the stars of their social media profiles, whether it’s through cute videos, candid moments, or even sponsored content that features baby products. The fact is that there is a tendency to monetize children’s lives and then put their lives on the internet for everybody to see. Such situations create consent issues and many more worrying issues, such as growing up in a world where everything he/she does from birth to the end will be documented and published on the internet.

Sharenting, AI, and Child Pornography: A Dangerous Cocktail

In earlier times, child pornography was difficult to access due to the physical barriers and secrecy involved. However, with the rise of AI tools and social media, predators now have unprecedented access to publicly available images of children. These predators don’t need explicit photos; even innocent images shared by parents can be manipulated using AI to create sexually explicit material.

This is where the dangers of sharenting and AI intersect. Publicly shared photos of children, especially without strict privacy settings, can easily become targets. What may start as harmless documentation of a child’s life becomes content that can be repurposed for dark, illegal purposes. With AI’s growing capabilities, it is now easier than ever to turn these photos into lifelike deepfakes and other forms of explicit content.

Legal Protections Under the IT Act

India’s Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000, includes provisions aimed at protecting children from online exploitation. Section 67B of the IT Act specifically prohibits the publishing, browsing, or transmission of material depicting children in sexually explicit acts. It provides for stringent punishments to deter such activities. However, these laws do not directly address the issue of parents unintentionally exposing their children to risk by oversharing online.

Although children may be shielded by the law from glaringly overt forms of exploitation, the said law does not govern the willingly-overbearing behaviour of parents who expose their children to the public without any courtesy, understanding of the privacy tools( or lack of them) or the repercussions. In most instances, young mothers as target content creators, for instance, unwittingly provide their children’s pictures on a silver platter to the predators hence making it easier for these pictures to be retrieved for unscrupulous activities such as pedophilia.

Why Documenting Should Not Equal Sharing

There is an understandable need and even a desire for parents to record every significant stage of their children’s development. It’s a way to capture fleeting moments of childhood that will one day become precious memories. However, sharing these moments with the world, especially on public platforms with no privacy settings, opens up a Pandora’s box of risks.
The child, who cannot agree to anything because they are yet to speak, is put in the limelight from the time they are born. Everything from their everyday activities, important events and even their most ordinary innocent moments are available for an audience that also contains malicious people. A child does not understand the complexities of the digital world, and while parents should protect their children, many unknowingly make them vulnerable to predators.

Momfluencers: A Call for Responsibility

The booming concept of momfluencing is one that needs to be dished out and consumed with a lot of caution. These influencers might be gaining followers and views by posting content that features their young children, but at what cost? The entire life of a child is documented for strangers to see, from infancy to adolescence. Such a digital footprint can lead to many issues with privacy, mental health, and self-identity in youngsters in future.
Content creators should shift their focus away from using their children for engagement and instead harness their own talents, interests, or skills to create content. Certainly, the money is appealing but implementing this practice of marketing children’s lives for likes, views or sponsorship is one danger that goes against ethics and requires action.

Conclusion: The Need for Vigilance

Sharenting, while seemingly harmless, can have dire consequences when parents fail to consider the long-term risks. AI’s evolving capabilities, combined with the oversharing tendencies of some parents, have created a dangerous environment where children’s privacy and safety are compromised. Parents, and most importantly, those who are in the public eye, must exercise caution in the information they make available to the public concerning their children. It is perfectly fine to seek the popularity that social media brings, but not at the expense of a child’s welfare.

(Author: Disha, Ph.D. Scholar | Senior Research Fellow, Dr. K. R. Narayanan Centre for Dalit and Minorities Studies, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, India?)