Hi Moms! My husband and I just started researching tools to filter internet content. To prevent our children from accessing inappropriate content on the internet. Whether intentionally or unintentionally. We are using a Mac.
How do you handle this at your house, and how is it working for you?
Thanks for the responses ladies! Because we have a Mac with an older OS, it is a little bit more difficult. My husband did find this information: http://www.opendns.com/familyshield and I think we are going to give this a try. It is a family computer(s) that are right in our family room, but I still worry about the kids accessing inappropriate web sites. There is just too much scary stuff out there!
put in parental controls and check history often. Is this a family computer you can monitor? My experience with the Mac is that we don't get many pop ups, which is helpful.
I did not allow my kids to use my space or facebook unless they gave me their passwords and allowed me to check randomly..........until they went to college......then they were on their own.
I'm curious to see your answers b/c right now the "security" for my 7 yo son is me breathing down his neck!
We have AOL which has parental controls already built in. Under the kids screen names you can set their age group which gives access to websites for them, like Nick Jr for 5-8 year olds. If they try to access any other website they get the message that they have to have parental approval and I get an email about what site it was. It also blocks them from trying to go through internet explorer. I can also block emails from addresses I have not pre-designated and block IM's. People complain that AOL is high but it comes with so much more than any other server.
We don't use spyware to control our daughter's laptop.
We do have wide open lines of communication and we TALK and LISTEN a lot about anything and everything.
I don't know about mac but we use the filters on the internet browsers.
If you use internet explorer under internet options , content , there is a content adviser that you can control the type of content is viewed.
