I'm hoping other parents (or kids ;) ) can help me with finding a good parental control program. There seems to be a pretty big selection out there! Primarily, I want to block all porn that seeps through on google "image" searches. (As that seems to be the one thing that Sean has been exposed to by no fault of his own :mad: .)
Anybody using a program? Or know of a good program?
Any help/ideas would be greatly appreciated!

It's tough because it seems like a lot of kids will still find ways around parental control software. I am surprised at how creative they can get sometimes. Not too long ago they had something on the news around here showing the extent some kids went to to access blocked sites and I was amazed how smart they would have to be to think of these things.

Sorry that didn't really answer your question though.

I'm all for Parental Controls.

Most parents could use some supervision, IMHO.

;)

If your problems are with Google specifically, you can set your preferences for Safe Searching on there. Here's their FAQ section to help you out (http://www.google.com/help/customize.html).

I'm all for Parental Controls.

Most parents could use some supervision, IMHO.

;)

Lol...well, yes :D ...but in this case it is possible the 13 yo needs a little of that, too!

If your problems are with Google specifically, you can set your preferences for Safe Searching on there. Here's their FAQ section to help you out (http://www.google.com/help/customize.html).

Thanks! I learned something I hadn't known. I changed the settings, and did a trial search, and it seemed to work pretty well. But yes, I do want more than that. Plus, he could very easily change that, if he had a mind to. (I don't think we're there yet, thank goodness!)

We have a password on both our computers so our kids have to get us to unlock it. My husband has some type of software ( I think it is called CyberNanny) that blocks inappropriate things. However, it ends up blocking things that we actually want so we shut it down.

The best advice we got was not to put the computers in the kids rooms. We have them in my husband's office so he is there a lot to see what they are into.

Thanks! I learned something I hadn't known. I changed the settings, and did a trial search, and it seemed to work pretty well. But yes, I do want more than that. Plus, he could very easily change that, if he had a mind to. (I don't think we're there yet, thank goodness!)
I recommend that you create an account for him that restricts his ability to download files or change settings. Your account with admin privileges should be password protected.

The best advice we got was not to put the computers in the kids rooms. This is the MOST important thing you can do! The screen should face into the kitchen or family room or wherever you are the most.

Putting the computer in a common area is probably the best defense. In my experience, blocking programs help, but never work like they're supposed to.

For example, a friend of mine was running a parental control program on his family computer. He told his son he would be monitoring his activity. Well, sure enough, my friend found evidence of porn sites on his computer. When he confronted his son about it, he found that his son figured out that he could access the 'Net from any Windows directory window. The blocking program only worked with Internet Explorer. (Try it. Just open "My Documents" and in the "Address" bar, type in a url. Bing, you're looking at the page.)

For a while, I tried to help my mother keep an eye on my little sister with Spector.

It's a powerful utility that willl not only monitor everything that they do on the computer, but it can be configured to silently block websites, and log Instant Messages as they come in.

The only downside is Spector is kind of expensive, I want to say it was about 80 bucks when I purchased it.

You can find more information on Spector here (http://www.spectorsoft.com/)

Klutch: Good advice which we've already taken. My concern is that at 13, there are times when he is home alone for maybe 2-3 hours at a stretch. Although it isn't often, I think it's enough time for him to get into trouble, even if it isn't on purpose. Thanks for the input, though.

Dexter, this sounds exactly like what I was looking for. I'll look into it. Thanks a million! (It isn't that I don't trust him, but rather that I don't want an innocent search to start a less innocent interest.)