Snapchat has become one of the most used applications, not only amongst the young generation but amongst the people of every age. You might even find your grandma sending snaps to her friends! With this growing popularity of Snapchat, how can someone not have it installed? It not only keeps you connected with friends over messages but also via sending photos and videos, wherever you are. Snapchat is being used by over one fifty million people a day, which is more than the amount of times that Twitter gets used in a day. Recently, Snapchat has introduced a new feature called Snap Map, which literally allows your friends to see where you are if your location is turned on in your phone.
This new feature has had some serious concerns from parents and the Snapchat population themselves. Anyone can literally see where you are, exact location — cross streets and all. Once you update your app to the latest version of Snapchat, you will be prompted to set up location sharing when you go into the Snap Map features. When you first start using it, you can decide if you want friends to see your location, just a few friends to see you, or no one at all. In true snap ghost fashion, if you want to hide from people knowing your whereabouts, you can select “ghost mode” to opt out of the location tagging. If you click on the illuminated colors around the map, you can actually click into people’s stories as they’re doing things around you. People can really see where you are, so you can’t even lie about your location if you are trying to ditch them for some reason.
But, worry not, as there is a ghost mode on Snapchat which solves your problem. It structures a map of your area and icons of all the people who have taken a snap. Those icons show where the snap was taken and then a link to the snap and on to your profile. All the times when you take a snap and post it with your location turned on, you appear to be on the snap map. We know that the people who monitor the app know where we are even if we turn on ghost mode on snapchat, but do we people want everyone to know where we are? I know many people who wouldn’t want this feature enabled.
Ghost Mode Availability on Snapchat
This feature has been introduced for all those people who don’t want other people to know where they are or what they’re doing. Snap Maps is an opt-in service, so if you never want to use the feature, you don’t have to. You can set up ghost mode on Snapchat when you first log into Snap Maps. You can specify who can see your location when you use Snapchat or you can select to use Ghost Mode when you want to.
On first opening Snap Maps:
- Open the Snapchat camera screen.
- Pinch to zoom into the center to access the map.
- Select to allow Snap Maps access to your location if you want to and hit Next.
- Set your other preferences as you see fit until you see Find Your Friends. Set this to Only Me (Ghost Mode) and select Next.
- Select Finish to save your choices.
This stops your location from appearing on the Snap Map as you have now turned on ghost mode on Snapchat. And if you want your location to be shared with only a handful of friends then you can even select those friends as there is a separate option for doing so. If at first you allowed your location to be seen on Snap maps to see how it works, and now you don’t want your location to be shared on the map, you can now turn on ghost mode on Snapchat, it’s never too late after all.
Changing privacy settings in Snap Maps:
- Open the Snapchat camera screen.
- Pinch to zoom in the center to access the map.
- Select the cog icon in the top right to access Settings.
- Toggle Ghost Mode to on.
You can also change this setting from within Snapchat itself if you prefer.
- Open Snapchat and select your Bitmoji in the top left.
- Select the cog icon in the top right to access Settings.
- Scroll to ‘See My Location’ and select it.
- Toggle Ghost Mode off.
Now your location services have been turned off and no one can see where you were or are and will go.
Why Should One Enable Ghost Mode on Snapchat?
Why should your location be hidden? It’s like asking why anyone should have any privacy in their life. Everyone needs their space even if it is from their friends and family and sometimes people want to be left alone. Not only this, there are many reason why someone should turn off their location and turn on ghost mode on Snapchat. Let’s talk about some of these reason, so that if you still do not have a made up mind about whether or not to turn on ghost mode on Snapchat, the answer can seem fair and well thought through.
Firstly, if you wish to be left alone, meaning if you don’t want anyone following you or knowing where you are, because you are going through something and need some time alone, they can follow you and reach you where you go. You don’t want to tell everyone that you are not at a certain location where your valuables might be kept and someone learns about you not safeguarding them and they see an advantage and an opening to rob you of your belongings, as you may never know who may turn out to be what, some people seem to show their true colors after a while.
You don’t feel like hanging out with your friends, because there is an exam coming up for which you need to study, but your friends are too cool for that and want to party and force you as well and the best way to get away with not going to the party is to give the excuse that you are out of town and are unavailable currently, but you appear on the snap map because you posted a snap and have not yet turned on ghost mode on snapchat, they decide to give you the cold shoulder or cut off from you just because you really needed to study but they don’t understand your situation even though you told them about it multiple times.
People may even harass you, if they find out about your location, as I mentioned above, some people show their true colors after a while. Some people may take this harassment as a joke, but they can follow your car and you may get scared that someone is targeting you. You can have an accident if you try to lose them behind and start driving at a high speed. Some parents are very concerned about snap map as it takes away their child’s privacy.
This can lead to the kids being bullied, for example sometimes some kids have to walk to the bus stand alone or have to walk home or go through narrow alleys, their frenemies or foes or just bullies can track them everyday if they do not turn on ghost mode on Snapchat. Those bullies can then plan how and when to attack the kid who is alone. This worries the parents the most. If you are away and have no one at the house, watching it, no guards, no nothing, then some people may see this as a good time to break into your house, and it will be even more easier if you do not have any alarms installed and no cameras to watch over your house.
All these reasons are more than enough to change someone’s mind about sharing their location with everyone on their friend list on Snapchat. Yes, you can turn on ghost mode on Snapchat if you wish to and you can even limit the number of friends who can see where you are or where you go or where you will go, but do you really trust many people with your whereabouts? Also, the fact, that, many people have had added some people on Snapchat because they were forced to or had to, like aunts and uncles, teachers, bosses, etc., but they need their privacy, they need their space, so it is not always a hoot to be tracked, never is. All these reasons for why you should not turn on your location and share it with the world must want you to turn on ghost mode on Snapchat right now. You can do this easily, as we have explained step by step about how to do so in the above paragraphs. Hopefully, this article must have helped you with your security concerns. Snapchat makes sure that their users are protected.
Michelle 
Adeline