Parental Control - ware

[coriolis]

I guess that I'm going to have to break down and pay money for something to reign in my kids surfing. I came home to an unpleasant surprise tonight. Someone, (I won't mention any names) was looking for, uh, "models" for "art" and when I saw the IE history, my eyes popped. Not to mention a load of spyware, a hijacked browser homepage, new icons on the desktop, and a ton of stuff running in the background. I got everything cleaned up.

I tried the IE content advisor, and that does stop the browsing to URL's that you specify. But it's useless against google links.

someone suggested Net Nanny. I'm just not keen on having yet another application running in the backgreound all the time using resources.

Any suggestions, anyone?

[isobar]

I know someone who uses Net Nanny, and it's worked out very well for them.

As much as it's unnerving to find your kids looking at something inappropriate on the net, I think that stuff is really looking for them. All it takes is one page view and all kinds of junk starts popping up and downloading. However, the risks are very different now than our generation when boys would sneak a peak at a magazine, which I guess is natural curiosity at their age. Don't be too hard on them, Ed.

[coriolis]

Let's put it this way: I won't be as hard on them as my wife would be on me. OUCH OUCH OUCH

[depotoo]

if you get zone alarm suite - it has controls that are super simple and require a password to change.
it is great!