Teens all over the country sport cell phones and PDAs. They text one another, and call each other. They stay up late at night in deep conversation, and they crowd school lunch rooms while they text their friend, who could be at another school, or could be just across the room.

Parenting a teen in these technological times can be a pretty big mission. You have to keep an eye on who they hang out with, where they go, who they talk to online, what websites they choose to set up, and whether or not they have inappropriate content and pictures on them.

You need to ensure that you discuss with them the need for internet security, on top of all the traditional parent-child chats. And now you have to worry about who they are spending all their phone time with.

Some parents leave their teens to it, trying to provide privacy and promote responsibility by giving their child space. But the truth is, sometimes when you are a parent, you need to know. It is particularly important to know who your teen is hanging out with or talking to when he or she has been behaving oddly, or when there are big things going on in their life or the lives of those around them.

But how do you find out who your teen is talking to? From experience you probably know that simple asking your daughter or son will usually not work - particularly if they feel they need to hide something from you.

Its easy to find out just who they are talking to in those late night conversations, by using a reverse phone number lookup service.

These online reverses phone lookup tools generally charge a small fee, but it will be well worth the peace of mind you will gain by knowing who your son or daughter is talking to.

Perhaps you have noticed free reverse phone lookup services on the internet, but these rarely do the trick. You can bet that many of the phone calls your teen receives come from other teens or people who are also using a cell phone.

Free directories do not provide information regarding cell phone numbers, but the paid services do. A reverse phone lookup directory that you pay for will provide you with not only names and addresses, but other information that relates to the owner of the phone number you research.