Heartland

Hi All

Someone I know here in Australia is thinking of setting up a PC support
business to protect children from accessing harmful material online,
a kind of "safe surf" service for parents home PCs.
and since some of you are tech savvy and have children of your own,
I thought I'd ask
(1) how you do the same in your own home
(2) what software/techniques do you use to do this
(3) are there existing software tools/ and or services out there which
can be used to accomplish this?

All advise gratefully received

currently my safe surfing is ensuring that Ivor the engine and tales from the river bank haven't been 'mashed up' by some 'wryly amusing creative' (i.e. stupid twit) on youtube. got caught out by some cretin's version of bagpuss once.

The best, and ONLY service that works:

Check on your kids regularly.

I know this is not exactly an answer to your question, but really, often the problem lies with the parents.

All my PCs at home are hooked up on a router with me as System Admin. Not much is going past me

IZ.

Place the only internet accessible computer in the main family room.
It works at our house .

jande wrote:Place the only internet accessible computer in the main family room.
It works at our house .

Reckon we'll do the same when Jnr is old enough.

I was content with stealing me Dads Mayfairs when I was a lad. There was none of this Internet malarky back then. It was all fields round here back then you know...It was 2 and 6 for a weeks shopping...

Hom_Corleone wrote:I was content with stealing me Dads Mayfairs when I was a lad. There was none of this Internet malarky back then. It was all fields round here back then you know...It was 2 and 6 for a weeks shopping...

Trees spake to us in a most peculiar language, a sort of brummie with a barky quality ...

IZ.

Norman Hunter wrote:

jande wrote:Place the only internet accessible computer in the main family room.
It works at our house .

Reckon we'll do the same when Jnr is old enough.

Saying that though, my sister had the same arrangment at her house.

Didn't stop the babysitter surfing the prawn sites while the kids were watching the tele .

Eh, I turned out just fine with no restrictions...

Dark wrote:Eh, I turned out just fine with no restrictions...

Same here. Those first few shocks do you good

I don't think it's so much surfing pr0n to worry about (although if I was a parent I would be concerned) as some of the social engineering tricks that scumbag paeodos get up to in order to get at kids.

Educating them in good cautious behaviour should always be the first line of defence. Like the 21st century equivalent of "don't take sweets off strangers".

I'd be inclined to go with the "don't treat the 'net as a babysitter" approach, set the security settings within your browser as high as possible, and whack a decent password on there too. Block social networking and chat sites unless you are there when the kids are using them.

Bottom line - you can use any netnanny programs out there, but the smartest of these applications can be outwitted by the dimmest 12-year old. Nothing but nothing beats parental supervision. Would you let your kid wander the streets of a strange city, talking to anyone, taking sweets and rides from strangers? So why would you let them do it online?

EvilBastard wrote:you can use any netnanny programs out there, but the smartest of these applications can be outwitted by the dimmest 12-year old.

True that. The internet isn't really "child friendly" and can probably never be made so.