The World Wide Web is an excellent resource of billions of people around the world. When you need to find out information about something, you have a wealth of data at your fingertips. Unfortunately, the Internet can also be a dark place. Adult “entertainment” websites are easy to access online. And we all know that can spell bad news when children can access them.
In today’s modern world, it is necessary for parents to put measures or controls in place to filter the content their kids can see. If you are worried about what your child might be watching online, check out these examples I use with my own children:
Have your ISP filter website access
Although not a foolproof method of protection, you can have your ISP enable Internet content filters. In the UK, BT, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media all offer free parental controls that get enabled on their equipment.
That means anyone in your home cannot circumvent those filters. At least, not unless they somehow contact your ISP and get them to disable the protection! The only downside to this approach is some “clean” websites might get blocked by mistake. If that happens, you can ask your ISP to whitelist the site so that it doesn’t get blocked in future.
Enable content filtering on your router
Another option at your disposal is to enable content filtering on your router. When you access your router’s admin, you can find those options under a section like “Parental Controls.”
You can fine-tune the settings so that some known website URLs can get blocked. You just need to make sure that your kids don’t know how to access the router’s admin system, or find out what the login details are.
One of my friends has a son that managed to do this. Things got somewhat extreme in his case as he had an obvious addition to “adult content.” The good news is places like Mt Pleasant Academy can help kids to overcome such addictions.
Enable parental controls on your devices
It’s likely you will have a plethora of devices in your home like computers, smartphones and tablets. Even today’s modern TVs have built-in web browsers! You will be pleased to know that all devices have settings where you can enable parental controls.
Put simply, they filter websites by particular words and phrases used in the URL. If you do this in addition to the other filtering tools at your disposal, you’ll have a high chance of blocking out any dodgy websites.
Use MAC filtering on your router
Last, but not least, here’s a tip for the geeky parents among us! Each device, regardless of what it is, has something called a MAC (Media Access Control) “address.” In a nutshell, it’s a unique reference ID, kind of like a serial number.
You can ensure that only devices with particular MAC addresses can get used on your Wi-Fi and network connections. That way, you can control and filter what sites your children visit on the Web.
By following the above tips and tricks, you can ensure that you’ve done your best when it comes to the online safety of your children.