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Our school has a rule that no-one may post an image of another child without the parent's permission. I would hope that other schools are the same. I don't think you need to adjust your expectations that no-one post images of your child. It's not just about adoption, but about of anyone's personal privacy, I think. Also, I wonder if it might be worth asking the school whether they could be a bit more sensitive about posing photos so that you see her back, rather than having her face covered? Don't feel pressured into being more open because of the way the school is dealing with it - it has to be about what you as a family feel comfortable with. We kept our kids and our FB accounts very private for the first five years or so, but as they have grown we have become more open (my AD does dance and drama shows, so it's hard to be private!). My AD is nearly 17, but doesn't have a FB account - she's not that interested, but I know she couldn't be appropriate. My son isn't either, thank goodness - I think FB is seen as something for the older generation now! x

Thank you it was a line up pic for world book day they have been great in the past and I know what you mean about not changing my expectations but she is involved in a lot as well drama choir and dancing and don’t want her to feel she is missing out it’s really hard to know what to do for the best.

I talked to my kids a lot about why they needed to keep their lives private in the early days - my AD had enough memories to know why and both were happy - so they weren't in the school pics for the local paper, for example. I guess a lot depends on the age of your AD and how long she's been with you? - and also how close you've to the BPs, how likely they are to see anything that is 'public'? xx

I think you need to weigh up the actual risk, are they named, is she recognisable, how much of a risk are the birth family in reality? I have become more relaxed about the school stuff as time has gone by, although my son has a very distinctive name and as he was older at adoption he is still very recognisable. But we live no where in the vicinity of the birth family and they really do not pose a threat. I have very little interest personally in social media but am having to learn rapidly now my son is his teens. As Haven says FB is increasingly seen as something for the oldies. My son is 14, he does have an FB account but rarely uses it. I think its instsgram, snapchat and a whole other host of platforms you need to worry about. To be honest, the birth family is the least of my worries, its the behaviour of the kids. On Friday my son was threatened and racially abused by two older teens via the PS4, he was contacted by them via his younger brother who is in a residential unit and appears to be totally unsupervised. I know I have strayed off your original question a bit but I feel the dangers to our children go way beyond birth parent issues. Particularly as you have a girl, I think you need to be talking to her at an early age about internet safety. It is part of the curriculum now but it needs to be reinforced. I think it took the incident we had on Friday for my son to understand why I am always interfering ( as he sees it) with his on line activity.

I think the use of emjoi is to block a face could be seen as humiliating . The school should be able to take photos they don't have her in shot but no one is non the wiser that their photos cannot be used. at the school where I work the children are strategically placed so they are not in any photos if they are needed for FB etc .

I agree with Serrakunda that as they get older they are very vulnerable and social media plays a big part in this. As for the birth family recognising them - keep whatever they know as general as possible - ie no identifying info such as photos with school jumpers that identify school - unless they are local the chances of them finding them are remote. Also no names with photos and if they’re in a group photo again it’ll be hard to recognise them. I don’t like the idea of their faces being blanked out but maybe they could be in s position where they’re less visible? Or wearing a hat or something?

Thank you all for your input It’s really hard to know what’s best but I will definitely ask the school to remove the emojis!

Hi Initially got school to carefully ensure either of our ac are in pics. But as they got older they all get tagged (even if not on fb) and a lot is straight on via Instagram anyway. So we explained the risks and what could happen to them and decided to support them developing fake name profiles (not as easy as it once was) There’s a book I’d recommend called Bubblewrapped children by Helen Oakwater.

Have to echo a number of the comments on here. We have also relaxed our vigilance in terms of our kids being identified via social media as they have got older, so I really don't worry much about their photos being shown. (Twirl is 15, but Galaxy is only 8 ). This is mainly because the chances of Twirl contacting her BF directly via social media are much higher than the chances of BF trying & succeeding in finding her, and we found that constantly being excluded from photos at school / dance / youth group / Brownies etc was far more damaging to her on an ongoing basis than the miniscule risk posed by BF (in our case). You will need to judge this for yourself, depending on your child's story. As others have also said, with a girl, we have had to put our energies into managing other risks on social media, mainly Twirl's own behaviour. So while Serrakunda was dealing with threats & racial abuse via online gaming on Friday (sorry to hear that Serrakunda), we were being visited by the police (again) due to Twirl sending indecent images via Facebook messenger to goodness knows who, and the images being discovered on a device belonging to an adult on the other side of the country. Her absolute vulnerability to exploitation was crystal clear during that police interview. This all came about because Twirl managed to find a way around the restrictions we had placed on her phone, and has had unrestricted access to Facebook and Instagram since December. Here's the equation: vulnerable girl + unrestricted social media access + 3 months = huge amounts of stress + police investigation + the prospect of identifiable indecent images of the vulnerable girl floating around the internet for years to come. So watch out for TikTok (used to be music.ly and was notorious for this and is very popular among girls from about 9+), Snapchat and Instagram, in particular and decide in advance how you are going to manage this / if you will allow it.

In the end I decided that as long as their names weren't included, they were very unlikely to be recognised from photos (mine were one and two when placed and two year old not seen by her bm snce she was 5 months old). But we kept their unusual first names, so that could have been identifying. Dd1 used a fake first name for a long time on social media (well, Facebook). I didn't push the bf aspect as I knew she was keen to meet bm, more the fact she did get bullied at secondary and it would be better that random students weren't able to bully her online too. Now they're teens they put photos etc on themselves. We've never had any contact from dd2's family and she isn't focused on meeting them, so tbh it doesn't feel like there's a threat there. Dd1 has met her birth family but only after she turned 18. Again they were not a threat anyway, just wanted to protect her from earlier contact, which we managed. I never wanted mine to be left out of photos etc at school. Worry more now about arguments with friends on social media (rather than being able to relax at home of an evening) and access to inappropriate sites and information. When self harm or eating disorders are mentioned (as they have been /are) I wonder how much has come from online.

I think covering any child’s face is wrong. It is degrading and draws attention to the child. My school were good with recognising the importance of photos and child safety. When he was in Year 3 he was singing for his choir outside the town hall. When the press took a picture, the headteacher asked him to stand at the back with her. He was one of the smallest, so couldn’t be seen in the photo, but as far as he was concerned he was in the photo, so he didn’t feel excluded. We talked to him extensively about what the impact of being photographed may do. He became excellent at hiding his face and would either turn away or do something like ‘dabbing’ when the photo was being taken. He’s now in Year 7, in secondary school, we have decided to allow photos as long he is okay with it. But we have never had photos of him on Facebook or any other social media. Although in reality, many parents take pictures of their children and my child in the background and see nothing wrong with it!

Realistically are they at risk? My girls weren't and so I allowed all publicity. But we live a long way from bf. You can't control this for ever. Imo it is humiliating for children to be singled out 're appearance in photos and should be avoided unless there is a huge danger. Many young people reconnect themselves with bf. It's better imo to be very open with children about bf and do extensive life story work with them from an early age so they are not that bothered about searching and will come to you if they are approached. Bubble wrapped children book is worth reading on this subject.

Thank you for all your comments it is great to hear different views on this . She probably isn’t at risk but she is not ready to talk about birth family so I am getting myself prepared for that and waiting until she wants to talk . But in the meantime have said to the school to just let her picture be shown . Will definitely try bubble wrapped as a few of you have suggested I know you can only hold back the tide for so long !