Apps are now available to enable parents to track the whereabouts of their children.
One is the Family Tracker, which has more than 100,000 users and is available worldwide.
Parents can track the location of their child on a map, send messages, and even activate an alarm on the phone remotely.
"You can see where your loved ones are without having to call or bother them," said creator Roberto Franceschetti of LogSat.
"We have an option for the sender to make a very nasty, noisy sound. It's a loud siren and we repeat that sound every two minutes until the person picks up," he said.
Parents don't need to own a smartphone to track their children. The service is also accessible via the web, as long as the phone that is being tracked is running the app, which runs on an iPhone or Android devices.
Family Tracker also has an additional service that keeps a log of all data generated by the app for a two-week period, which the company calls GPS breadcrumbs.
A similar app called Life360 is credited with helping families stay connected during last year's tsunami in Japan.
