While nearly three quarters of children own a mobile phone, half of parents don't allow them to spend their own pocket money on digital downloads, British figures show.
The research, by Halifax, shows that concerns about "inappropriate content" and overspending are the top worries that stop parents from letting their children spend money on downloading content on to smartphones and tablets.
Numbers show that 91 per cent of children with mobile phones own a smartphone and nearly two thirds (63 per cent) own a tablet.
But parents' rules are not always effective as the figures show that more than eight in 10 (85 per cent) of children are downloading from the internet, with games and apps being the most popular downloads, followed by music and then films.
With the vast majority of children saying their parents pay their mobile phone bills, a third of parents worry that their children are overspending online, with 39 per cent of dads concerned compared with 26 per cent of mums.
The TNS Omnibus surveyed 1202 children aged between eight and 15, and more than eight in 10 of them said it was the responsibility of the parents to pay their phone bills, while only one in 10 said it was up to them to pay it.
Smart devices have massively overtaken the most popular gadgets of just a few years ago.
Now only a third of children own an iPod, and less than a quarter have an MP3 player.
