Snapchat is a place to connect and communicate with friends and loved ones, but it’s important to know various ways to help protect your security and safety. We recommend checking out our Safety Centre to learn more about Our Policies, Our Team, and information for Parents and Educators. Keep in mind that Snapchat is for ages 13+.
We also offer in-app support for Snapchatters who may be experiencing a mental health or emotional crisis, or who may be curious to learn more about these issues and how they can help friends dealing with them. Our new Here For You feature shows safety resources developed with experts when Snapchatters search for certain topics, including those related to anxiety, depression, stress, grief, suicidal thoughts and bullying.
Here are some tips to help protect your security and safety on Snapchat:
Check Privacy Settings: Control who can send you Snaps, view your Stories, and see your location.
Check Your Privacy Settings
Check your privacy settings to choose who can send you Snaps, view your Stories, or see your location on Snap Map.
Use a Strong Password: Use a unique, long, mixed-character password; never share it.
Use a Strong Password
Select a password that’s at least 8 characters long, and don’t include personal information, like your name, username, phone number or birthday. Include a mix of numbers, symbols, and capital and lowercase letters in your password. Never share your password with anyone – not even us! A Snapchat representative will never ask you for your password. We don’t need it to help you.
Don’t share your password with others, and don’t use the same password for other apps or websites. If you don’t remember your Snapchat password, learn how to reset your password.
Verify Your Phone and Email Address: Ensure your email address and phone number are up to date and accurate.
Verify Your Email Address and Mobile Number
Verify that the email address and mobile number associated with your account are accurate in Snapchat settings. Adding a secure email address and phone number helps to ensure you can recover your account in the case of a login issue. It is a best practice to ensure your phone and email address are up to date at least once a year and anytime you change your phone number or email provider or domain. If you have a phone number on your account you no longer have access to, make sure you add your current phone number, or if you don't have a new phone number, add a passkey from settings and contact support to remove the old phone number.
We recommend that avoid signing up with, using, or adding a temporary or disposable phone number (i.e. Google Voice, TextNow) to your account. The phone number could be recycled (meaning re-assigned to someone else) at a later time and result in a compromise of your account.
Manage your active sessions and devices: See which devices you’re logged into, and remove devices you don’t recognise.
Manage Your Sessions
You can use Snap’s Session Management Centre to see all of the sessions logged into your account. If you’re not familiar, a “session” represents an individual device or browser signed into your account. It’s important to keep an eye on the Session Management Centre for your account security, especially if you suspect someone may have gained unauthorised access to your account.
If you see a device or browser you do not recognise, you should immediately terminate that session and change your password. If you lose access to your account, please contact us.
Add a Passkey: Add a Passkey as a secure and easy login method in the event you forget your password or lose your device.
Add a Passkey
Passkeys are a more secure and easy to use alternative to passwords. Passkeys are stored securely in your device and are not accessible by anyone, which makes them immune to password breaches and phishing. Snapchat can't access this biometric data. Learn more about Passkeys here.
Add Two-Factor Authentication: Enable for a more secure login.
Set Up Two-Factor Authentication
Two-factor authentication is a security setting which enables an additional verification step, a one-time passcode or Authenticator code, for every login on the Snapchat app or web. This makes your account more secure. We recommend using a trusted app like Google Authenticator, Duo, Microsoft Authenticator, Authy, 1Password, and LastPass to generate these codes.
You can set up two-factor authentication right in the Snapchat app! Learn more about two-factor authentication.
Remove Login Information from Shared Devices: Log out and remove login details from shared and friends’ devices
Remove Login Information from Shared Devices
If you log on to your Snapchat account from a friend’s or shared device make sure that you log out once you are finished and remove the account from the login screen. For more information review this article.
Forget Unrecognised Linked Devices
Forget Unrecognised Linked Devices
When you forget a linked device, you will be logged out on that device and any new login will require two-factor authentication, if you have it enabled.
Friend Wisely: Only add people you know in real life.
Keep it Between Friends
Snapchat was made for keeping in touch with your close friends. We recommend that you only friend or accept friend requests from people that you know in real life.
Report Abuse: Report harassment, bullying, or other safety concerns; block and leave group chats if necessary.
Report Abuse on Snapchat
You can always report abuse on Snapchat, including harassment, bullying, or any other safety concern. If someone is making you uncomfortable, you can also block that Snapchatter and leave any group chat. Learn more about reporting abuse or safety concerns.
If you’re not in the US, there are other organisations that can help you. Learn more about crisis resources worldwide.
Control Snap Map Privacy: Control location sharing; use Ghost Mode for invisibility.
Customise Your Location on the Map
Only the people you choose can see your location – you can choose to share your location with all your friends you’ve added back, just a group of select friends, or you can even turn on Ghost Mode when you want to go off the grid. Snaps you submit to Snap Map can still show up on the Map, though!
Learn more about how to customise Snap Map location settings.
Adjust Story Privacy: Adjust who can view your Stories.
Change Who Can View My Story
The default privacy setting is that only Snapchatters you’ve added can view your Story. The privacy settings you have when you send a Snap to your Story will remain for that Snap, even if you change the settings later.
Learn how to manage My Story.
Be Aware of Screenshots: Be aware others can screenshot your Snaps.
Don’t Forget About Screenshots
Snaps are designed to delete by default, but people that you send Snaps to can still take a screenshot or take a picture of the Snap with another device, so it’s a good idea to think before you share.
Avoid Common Social Engineering Schemes
Don’t add a phone number or email address to your account that you don’t control, and don’t disclose or share your one-time passcodes or login links to anyone, ever.
Join Family Centre on Snapchat
Family Centre helps parents get more insight into who their teens are friends with on Snapchat, and who they have been communicating with, while still respecting their teens' privacy and autonomy. It's designed to reflect the way parents engage with their teens in the real world, where parents usually know who their teens are friends with and when they are hanging out, but don’t eavesdrop on their private conversations.
Family Centre will provide parents, carers, or any trusted adult over the age of 18 the ability to, among other things:
- See which Snapchat friends or Groups their teens have chatted with in the last seven days, in a way that still protects their privacy by not revealing the actual contents of their conversations (Snaps and messages);
- See a complete list of Group members in Group chats their teen is in that have been active over the last seven days;
- See a complete list of their teen's existing friends and easily view new friends their teens have added, making it easy to start conversations about who their new contacts are;
- Limit their teen’s ability to view certain content in the Stories and Spotlight tabs;
- Disable My AI from responding to their teen;
- View their teen's birthday settings;
- Easily and confidentially report any accounts parents may be concerned about directly to our 24/7 Trust and Safety team.