You can track your own child’s location in India with their knowledge, and the law expects a parent to consent on behalf of anyone under 18. What you should not do is install a tracker secretly: it is poor for trust, several app stores ban hidden trackers outright, and a teenager who finds it will simply switch the phone off. Here is how to do it properly.

This is general information, not legal advice. Laws change and situations differ.

What Indian law says, in plain words

India’s Digital Personal Data Protection Act treats everyone under 18 as a child and requires a parent or guardian’s verifiable consent before an app processes a child’s personal data, which includes location. It also restricts tracking and behavioural monitoring of children, with exemptions set out in the rules for things like safety. In practice: the parent, not the teenager, is the one agreeing, and the app has to record that.

What Traxl requires

  • Everyone enters a date of birth once. Under-13s can’t use Traxl at all: the account is deleted on the spot.
  • A 13–17-year-old can only join a Circle through an invite a parent or guardian sends from their own app, after ticking a declaration that they are the guardian and consent to the tracking.
  • That declaration (who, when, which wording) is stored with the membership.
  • Teenagers can’t create Circles, and are never shown personalised ads.
  • The teenager sees exactly who is in the Circle, can pause sharing, and can leave.

The details are in our privacy policy, section 7.

The conversation matters more than the app

Families who make tracking work tend to do three things. They say why: “I want to know you got to tuition, not read your messages.” They make it mutual: the parent is on the map too. And they agree the limits: no checking during school hours, no interrogation about every stop. A tracker used as evidence turns into a fight; used as a safety net it mostly goes unnoticed.

What it won’t do

Traxl shows location, routes and an SOS. It does not read messages, record calls, or report which apps are used. If that is what you are looking for, that is a different category of software with different, and in many places illegal, implications.

Set it up together

Install Traxl on both phones, create the Circle on yours, send the invite with the guardian box ticked, and let your teenager accept it on theirs. Set home and school as places, turn on quiet hours for the night, and do the battery settings on their phone so it keeps running. Then leave it alone and let it be boring.