Friday, October 31, 2008

Chapter 4 - Blocking software - Net Nanny

First I was surprised how easy it was to configure. Few clicks and everything is under control. Is it?
I am sure this software can be used for some other purpose (blocking some sites at work ..), but I am looking the case where parents want to forbid their children access to certain information in the web.
First I was blocking following possibilities: pornography, gambling, intimate apparel, adult/mature, drugs/alcohol, hate/violence, illegal activities, proxy.
I was trying to search with the following words: vodka, Pina Colada, flirt, sex, adults, shooting, lingerie and etc.. Nothing suspicious appeared.

* When I was looking for words gun in different versions I was able to read 'How to choose a handgun', How to use gun sights for target shooting and etc. I was surprised. I blocked 'violence'..

* When I was looking for word 'pleasure' - then there were some pictures which was quite surprised, that i could see, for example 1, and I was able to see some small pictures of woman in lingeries, when I clicked on them the blocking window appeared. After some time I didn't see these pictures anymore, although I didn't change anything in the settings. Weird.

* I was looking 'drunk', 'how to get drunk fast' and etc.. Seems that everything is working there..

* I was looking 'erotic and all the Web content was blocked, but I was able to see pictures. .. Its because I didn't block the images. But its weird. Parent has to block the images and videos, because otherwise child can see the inappropriate content. But if child is looking for flowers, dogs, cats, he/she is not able to see pictures at all. Some development needed there..

If child is trying to look something forbidden from Internet and overrides the request, parent gets the notice via email or can just look it themselves without any notices. And also there is possibility to make reports of web page uses.
I think this is worth to buy as it really limits the access to the certain pages.

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