“Sharenting”: What happens when children's lives are shared online? With Keneisha Sinclair-McBride, PhD

In 2026, the risks of posting about your children online have shifted. AI can now take an innocent photo of a child and turn it into something sinister, and the line between real and fake is blurring fast. Dr. Keneisha Sinclair-McBride, a clinical psychologist at Boston Children’s Hospital, explains that while most parents share to connect with family or find community, the digital landscape has changed enough that the old rules no longer apply. The core question is no longer just about privacy—it’s about consent, permanence, and whether the moment is being lived or performed.

Why parents share and what changes with AI

Most parents post about their children as a bid for connection—keeping grandparents updated, sharing milestones, or finding community around parenting philosophies. These are genuine benefits. But the risks have escalated. As Sinclair-McBride puts it, “from the beginning, when you post something on the internet, it no longer really belongs to you. Anyone can download it, anyone can access it and do whatever they would like with it.” Now, AI makes that worse. Innocent photos can be manipulated into something sinister. Even benign uses—turning a child into a cartoon or changing their outfit—raise questions about what is real and what is fake. “What does that mean for a child?” she asks. “If they can change what your appearance or change your outfit or change t