What is a good parental control software?

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meggido

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I have been trying to find the right mans to protect the family from the bad stuff on the net like porn and other stuff. I also want to limit the time that my kids can get on the net so that they have to go outside or read. I have been looking at two in particular, one is www.wisechoice.net and the other is hedgebuilders.com. Any ideas. I would like one that might not be able to be over ridden due to my own tendencies to look at internet porn.
 
I use a netgear r7000 router. it comes with a free subscription to OpenDNS, which will handle all of your filtering needs. You can also do custom filters.

You can also set schedules per radio, so your kids would have access to their SSID for certain hours and the adults in the family can use another if you so choose.

It also has a slick smart phone app that lets you bump any device you want off the network temporarily. It comes in handy.
 
I was also going to recommend OpenDNS. It is free and can be used with any router.
It has several categories for filtering that you can use and you can also view which URLS have been accessed and set custom black- or white-lists.
 
The best I found, when my kids were young, was to only allow them to use the computer located in the familyroom (or any room) where mom and dad could see the screen, and it could only be used when we were there…they had no passwords.

Best software program language command? “No” followed with “Because I said so”!
 
Your honesty is appreciated. 🙂 I have similar problems with pornography.

If you want something free, I suggest K9 Web Filter. It will block YouTube unless you change that, but otherwise it is an excellent resource at keeping obvious porn and adult imagery out of your house. (Though, if you don’t want to be bypassing it all the time, might want to let your wife or someone who’s helping you with this have the password to it.)

And if you ever do find a website you’re not supposed to be able to get to, you can report it, and usually it will be filtered.
 
OpenDNS works on their ipods, laptops, game consoles, etc. whether you are looking over their shoulders or not.
 
The following is coming from the perspective of an (almost adult-aged) teen who had parental controls installed on his computer for a year:

I found it to be extremely detrimental for my projects. It kept blocking completely safe websites which would be useful for my projects. If I remember correctly, the software used was netnanny. It was eventually taken off because it was more detrimental than beneficial.

My advice would be to set up a custom filter (like others have suggested) instead of using software like netnanny. That way your kids will be able to work on their research papers without the problem of netnanny blocking every single useful website your kids visit. I might be exaggerating netnanny’s blocks a bit, but it was still rather detrimental.

-preb34
 
preb34 said:
The following is coming from the perspective of an (almost adult-aged) teen who had parental controls installed on his computer for a year:

I found it to be extremely detrimental for my projects. It kept blocking completely safe websites which would be useful for my projects. If I remember correctly, the software used was netnanny. It was eventually taken off because it was more detrimental than beneficial.

My advice would be to set up a custom filter (like others have suggested) instead of using software like netnanny. That way your kids will be able to work on their research papers without the problem of netnanny blocking every single useful website your kids visit. I might be exaggerating netnanny’s blocks a bit, but it was still rather detrimental.

-preb34
Click to expand...
I use Covenant Eyes, and do research for a living. It VERY rarely blocks anything I need.
 
preb34 said:
The following is coming from the perspective of an (almost adult-aged) teen who had parental controls installed on his computer for a year:

I found it to be extremely detrimental for my projects. It kept blocking completely safe websites which would be useful for my projects. If I remember correctly, the software used was netnanny. It was eventually taken off because it was more detrimental than beneficial.

My advice would be to set up a custom filter (like others have suggested) instead of using software like netnanny. That way your kids will be able to work on their research papers without the problem of a non-customized software blocking every single useful website your kids visit. I might be exaggerating netnanny’s blocks a bit, but it was still rather detrimental.

-preb34
Click to expand...
 
meggido said:
I have been trying to find the right mans to protect the family from the bad stuff on the net like porn and other stuff. I also want to limit the time that my kids can get on the net so that they have to go outside or read. I have been looking at two in particular, one is www.wisechoice.net and the other is hedgebuilders.com. Any ideas. I would like one that might not be able to be over ridden due to my own tendencies to look at internet porn.
Click to expand...
I recommend OpenDNS or Blue Coat K9 Web Protection. (Both of these are free.) Both of these were discussed on an older thread hear at Catholic Answers Forums:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=647064
 
Neofight said:
The best I found, when my kids were young, was to only allow them to use the computer located in the familyroom (or any room) where mom and dad could see the screen, and it could only be used when we were there…they had no passwords.

Best software program language command? “No” followed with “Because I said so”!
Click to expand...
👍👍👍👍

This is really the best option. There is no such thing as an internet filter that can employ the perfect balance between blocking too many sites and not blocking enough.

If your filter is loose enough that you can access all the clean sites you need for research, it’ll not be tight enough to block ALL the porn, and vice-versa.
 
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