| Parental control software is a type of software program purpose-built for your home computer which controls computer usage, filters the Web content, thereby allowing parents to secure a safe online experience for their family.
When picking out a parental control software tool for your family, consider necessary features it should include. The first thing is that the software should be user-friendly and easy to install and set up. Secondly, the tool should be protected with a password and difficult for knowledgeable children and teens to turn it off. It should filter or block anything that a parent finds improper for a child. Some software packages include profanity masking - even in e-mails and instant messages - a proxy monitor to keep your child from browsing a proxy website to avert the parental control programs, and social networking controls to block or control your child's behavior on popular sites, such as Facebook and MySpace. There are also parental controls that offer chat monitoring. This feature is great for blocking inappropriate words and keeping detailed reports of live conversations for you to have an idea who your kid is talking with and what they are chatting about when you are not monitoring.
Other features that parents may find valuable include time limiting which allows you to set a schedule for your child's Internet usage to certain times of the day and reporting features that will give you a detailed report of all of the Internet activity on your computer. Some of the programs also have pre-set profiles grounded on age groups specially designed to create a very user-friendly set-up for computer-illiterate parents who want to protect their children from some of the dangers associated with using the Internet. Some software packages allow parents to use the package on a network of up to 3 home computers. This is a great feature to search for, if you have a few computers at home or if your child has their own portable PC.
Even though the software programs have much in common and are aimed to allow parents to control computer use and filter the Internet content, they differ in features that may make one or another work better for your family or situation. For instance, some software tools really work well with social networking websites while some do not, so if your kid has a personal profile on any of these sites, you will want to opt for a parental control that has those features. Each program has something different to offer, so take the time to read each review carefully to decide which software tool is right for you. |