Internet Safety

Good parenting (never an easy job) can't be replaced by technology, but sometimes technology can help you be a better parent. Apps can give you tools and super parenting powers you never dreamed of before. While there are many parent app lists that can keep your child educated and entertained, here are some apps that will keep your kids safe and healthy.

With latest version of the Apple's mobile software (iOS 5), parents are getting an increased level of parental control over previous versions. With iOS 5 parents can control almost everything a child can do on their iDevice (iPod, iPhone, iPad). While that sounds great in theory, in practice it can be very frustrating. You can set restrictions on whether your child has access to Safari, Camera, FaceTime, Game Center, YouTube, the App Store, whether they can install or delete software, etc.  Unfortunately these options are binary, your kid can surf or she can't, see YouTube or not.


When it comes to allowed content sold/rented/accessed via ITunes, iOS 5 has much better parental controls. You can set the age content level for music & podcasts, movies, TV shows and apps based on industry content ratings.

As an added bonus, you can use the new free Find My Friends app to track your kid's iPhone location in real time. 


As good as iOS 5's parental controls are, they are still very basic and lack the robustness of a dedicated app that allows more nuanced control. For example you may have a teenager that needs to access the web via Safari but you still want to have some safe browsing and Internet filtering that is age appropriate. Enter the dedicated apps.

Child Safe Browser with Internet Filtering and Parental Controls


As a parent and a developer of the Mobicip Safe Browser (a popular Internet content filtering service for the iPod touch , iPhone iPad , Windows 7 and Linux, with parental controls and monitoring), I lead a team that thinks about children’s Internet safety 24/7. After exhaustive research with child development psychologists, high-tech law enforcement officials, Internet safety experts, school IT directors, teachers and parents, we have developed mobile Internet safety solutions centered around three content filtering levels:

• The elementary school level in our kid-friendly browser blocks social networking, gaming, shopping, entertainment, clothing, and news sites/content, in addition to the middle and high school level restrictions listed below.
• The middle school level in the Mobicip Safe Browser blocks online gambling, dating, liquor, and chat sites/content, in addition to the high school level restrictions listed below.
• High school level in the Mobicip Safe Browser is the least restrictive and blocks adult, sexual, weapons, violence, proxy, virus and hacking sites/content.

Our app costs only $4.99 (premium subscriptions are $9.99 a year allowing you more robust monitoring features on multiple devices).

While I believe very strongly that our kid safe browser with Internet filtering parental controls is the very best on the market, you do have other options. K9 and BSecure (both free) and SurfBalance ($4.99) are available, but we feel that their less-than-robust Internet filtering falls short of our high standard for child-safe browsers. Regardless of which you choose, even if it is a competitor, we urge you to install some kind of safe browser solution on all your kids' Internet devices.

Kid Tracking:
Life360 (free or $4.99/month subscription for premium features) is a family locator app that instantly displays the GPS coordinates of all your family members (even if they don't have smart phones). The ability to work independent of a phone's software and hardware, gives this app a leg up over iOS 5's Find My Friends app. With Life360, you can send a message via the app to see if a family member is safe. Family members can check in at a safe location (school, home, Grandma's house, etc.). If a family member goes missing, you can send the authorities all their personal information (photos, GPS history, etc.). Of all the safety apps we tried, this one has by far the most comprehensive features list. As an added bonus, Life360 offers pocket-size GPS devices that can be used for children that don't have phones. Each device costs $99 to purchase and then $10/month for data service.


Someday, your kid might need to alert you that there is an emergency, but they need to do it subtly so that onlookers can't see. This is where the Silent Bodyguard, a secret panic button/location tracker app ($1.99), comes in. With the touch of an icon, the Silent Bodyguard app will send out an emergency SOS message to email, text, Twitter/Facebook with your kids' GPS location every 60 seconds without alerting onlookers.


Latchkey Kids:
You can't always be there (physically) for your kids. Every family wrestles with the question of what age their child should be given the responsibility of coming and going by themselves.

Here are two apps by lock manufacturers that come with wireless computer controlled hardware locks that you can install on your front door. These apps can email or text you automatically when someone enters your home. You can assign a specific entry code to each child so that you instantly know when each child is safe at home. If your kid forgets their entry code, you can often open the front door remotely.

The Lockitron uses your iPhone as the key. After you install the hardware on your front door, you just download the free app to your kid’s iPhone, and follow the simple instructions. You can even remotely open the door with your laptop.

The Schlage LiNK kit, offers some of the same features, but requires an $8.99 monthly charge to send/receive texts and work remotely. The system also works with Schlage's wired camera.

If you have a home security system like ADT, you can also download a free app called ADT Plus that can give you a full picture of your home from sensors and installed web cams.
 
(Live web cam view from ADT Plus sent to your phone.)

Home automation specialists like Control4, can build you a custom latchkey security system that you can run from your mobile phone. If you are going the home automation route anyway, it might be a good feature to consider.

If you want to keep your kids safe at home when you are not there, first install a kid-safe browser like Mobicip on their iPhone, iPod or iPad. You can also install some hidden nanny cams that you can access from your iPhone.

Kid Emergency Information Software:
The FBI's Child ID App (free) is one app you hope you never need. 

You type in your child's vital statistics, shoot a picture of your kid with the iPhone's camera and you have all the information you need to pass on to authorities should your child go missing. The app includes a quick way to dial 911, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and to send your child's information and photo to authorities. The app also includes two very useful checklists detailing what to do in the first and second 24 hours a kid goes missing. While this app is designed for parents, one could easily see a teacher on a field trip using it (with the parents’ permission of course).


Health:
While the FBI's app is very good for a missing child, if your child has a medical condition, cough up $2.99 for iEmergency ICE Family Pro. If you or your child has a life-threatening condition, such as a serious allergy, this app's lock screen could literally be a life saver. Totally worth the three bucks right there.


But there's more. This app allows you (or anyone in your family who shares the app) to have complete medical history, doctor's phone number, insurance, etc for all family members. The app allows a first responder to instantly call your top emergency contacts.


If your child is having unusual health symptoms you may be wondering if it could be a sign of something serious. Find out with the WebMD Mobile app (free). There are a lot of health apps out there, but this one is considered the best because the content is approved by doctors in that field.

Sex Offender Finder:
Part of keeping your kid safe is knowing the dangers around you. Thanks to Megan's Law, sex offenders have to register with the authorities. With the Offender Locator Lite (free) app you can see a map of the local sex offenders, plus mug shots and a list of their crimes. (Life360 also offers sex offender mapping.) No matter where you are living, this app will definitely give you the creeps once you know how close they live to your home or school. But forewarned is forearmed, if you see any of these people hanging around your child you will know to get him or her quickly out of danger.

Raising a kid to be a safe and healthy adult is a challenge, but with these mobile apps you'll have the situation well in hand.

About Author
Suren Ramasubbu is the Founder of Mobicip.com, a popular Internet content filtering service for the iPod touch , iPhone iPad , Windows 7 and Linux, with parental controls and monitoring. Mobicip's mission is to provide a safe, secure and educational Internet experience for school-age children. Mobicip's dynamic content filtering technology helps parents protect their children from a new wave of Internet hazards stemming from mobility so they can learn and love the mobile web. By delivering an online safety net through its parental control solution, Mobicip gives parents and educators the ability to safeguard their children's mobile devices.  Before launching Mobicip.com, Suren was an Operating Manager at Agilent Technologies, responsible for a division's enterprise web infrastructure strategy and team. At Agilent, Suren has led QA automation strategy, evangelized software engineering methodologies, and developed software for RF and mixed-signal electronic design automation. Suren has also volunteered as a consultant for educational technology projects and led successful United Way volunteering and fundraising campaigns. He holds a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering from Virginia Tech and an MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

We are happy to announce that Mobicip' Safe Browser 2.8.1 is now

If you have previously downloaded Mobicip, you can download the update for free by using the same iTunes account as before. 2.8.1 is an important update as the following critical issues were resolved:

"Open in" feature

This feature has been requested mainly by students and schools. Apparently, students want to open PDF files in their favorite application like iBooks or GoodReader, some of which allow the PDF to be edited. In version 2.8.1, opening a PDF (or DOC, DOCX, XLS, PPT, etc.) displays an "Open in" button at the top right of the screen, like this:

Touch the button to select the application you would like to open the file with.

You should now be able to view the file from within the selected application, like iBooks for example.

iOS 5 Compatibility Issues

As some of you had reported, certain websites were not being rendered correctly on iOS 5. This would not have affected a vast majority of users, but for those who noticed the problem, it could have been very annoying. Luckily, we were able to identify and fix the problem quickly as part of the 2.8.1 update.

Error Connecting to the Network Issue

Many thanks to the users from the UK, middle east and asia who reported a vexing "error connecting to the server" problem when they set the device time to a zone that did not correspond to their location. We did resolve the problem a while ago, but it wasn't a big enough problem to merit an update on its own. The fix finally got out during the 2.8.1. update.

Authentication Crash Issue

Some users ran into an unrecoverable crash during authentication after changing WiFi networks, mostly in school environments. Thanks to all the schools that worked with us, provided crash reports for investigation, and tested the beta version before we rolled out the update. The issue is now resolved as well.

Thanks for your patience as we resolved these issues. Please download the latest update and let us know what you think.

Just posted a reply (reproduced below for your reading convenience) to this article by ZDNet's Christopher Dawson.

Chris:

Your article is very informative and highlights a key oversight by Zeeland. However, your assertion that:

"Most CIPA-compliant systems can filter off-campus devices through a simply proxy setup which can be pushed to iPads through the MDM system mentioned above."

is not correct. MDM systems will allow you to setup a proxy only when the device is on WiFi networks that you manage. Off-network proxy setting is possible if you setup a VPN, but turning off VPN is as easy as selecting Settings > VPN > OFF.

Companies like Mobicip and Lightspeed offer an alternate browser on iOS devices. By setting up this alternate browser and turning off Safari, you can ensure that the kids are offered safe browsing on any network. This is a limitation of the iOS platform and SDK, and Apple has its own justifiable reasons to keep it that way.

The alternate safe browser is a "good enough" solution to the problem, but it does mean turning off Safari and losing some of the conveniences (like weblinks on the home screen, links from emails opening in Safari etc.). So schools end up weighing the pros and cons and some decide to go one way or another. Zeeland obviously took the risky option and ended up being burned by it.

I would fault the school administration for not communicating the hazards and possible workarounds (many schools simply recommend that parents install Mobicip, which is available as a retail product through the App Store), but I think the administration would have been smart enough to setup a proxy through the MDM if at all that was possible. If only the options were that simple...

Thanks for bringing attention to this issue, though.

Parents.com writer Linda DiProperzio shares ways to protect your child from unwanted bullies in cyberspace in the article: 'Best Apps and Products to Prevent Cyberbullying'. 

DiProperzio lists Mobicip as one of the the tools that will guard your kid's online safety. She also lists NearParent app and other great apps. Read the article here.

Enough Is EnoughSM (EIE) recently sent a great reminder for National Cyber Security Month. In 2002, October was named Cyber Security Month and is an annual commemoration of the importance of promoting cyber security and safety. This year's theme is "Our Shared Responsibility." EIE President and CEO, Donna Rice Hughes, helped create a three pronged strategy for Internet safety that involves the public, the technology industry and law enforcement sharing the responsibility to protect children on the Internet (see below.) To get more information and support efforts to protect children online, please go here: https://enough.org/
  
EIE's three-pronged approach of shared responsibility includes:

1. Educating the public, specifically adults about cyber dangers and safety solutions primarily through the media and EIE's Internet Safety 101SM multimedia program resources. The program is the only multimedia program designed to educate, equip and empower caring adults to protect children from pornography, sexual predators and cyberbullies and to keep kids safe and secure on social networking sites, gaming and mobile devices.

2. Encouraging and working alongside the technology industry, including industry giants like Google and Microsoft, to implement viable, family friendly technology solutions and corporate policies and best practices. EIE incorporates cyber security technology solutions into all its Internet Safety 101SM program resources. Additionally, EIE's Internet Safety 101 program is featured as a requisite teaching tool by many of its partners to equip, educate and empower communities with the ability to implement cyber secure practices.

3. Promoting legal solutions that call for aggressive enforcement of existing laws and enactment of new laws to ensure security and safety of children and families. In April, Donna Rice Hughes, was invited as a cyber security expert by the U.S. State Department to educated State Department employees about cyber security and the digital threats kids face, as well as what can be done to prevent cyber crimes against children.         

ABOUT EIE
Enough Is Enough (EIE) a non-partisan, 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, emerged in 1994 as the national leader on the front line of efforts to make the Internet safer for children and families.  Since then, EIE has pioneered and led the effort to confront online pornography, sexual predation and other dangers associated with the evolving web with innovative initiatives and effective communications.  EIE's Internet safety 101 Program is a comprehensive, multi-media program that addresses the critical need for parental education and empowerment to protect kids.

Get more information here: EIE Newsletter, Enough.org, and EIE Blog.

If you are a parent of a tween or teen, I’m sure you have worried at some point about the level of violence, gore and bloodshed in video games. The games are now so ubiquitous and accessible, on a computer, on an iPad or iPod Touch, or a Smartphone. Apparently, in 2005 the California legislature passed a well-intentioned law, according to this LA Times article, that

would have imposed a $1,000 fine on those who sold or rented a video game to someone under 18 that featured the "killing, maiming, dismembering or sexual assaulting" of a human image and "appeals to deviant or morbid interest." Before the law could take effect, the gaming industry sued, and judges put the law on hold.

The US Supreme Court recently struck down this law in favor of a parent’s right to decide what video games their children can buy. Parry Aftab, a prominent CyberSafety advocate, comments on her blog:

Parents can and should be reviewing ratings on box games they purchase or their children purchase. They should be discussing the ratings and rules with their children and enforcing those rules with spot checks form time to time. (The best rule in parenting is "trust, but verify!") Have a discussion with the parents of their friends and come to a common understanding about which games are okay for them to play and which aren't. (There is power in parental numbers :-)).

Yes, there is technology that can assist parents. For instance, you could use a service like Mobicip to setup parental control restrictions on the iPad, iPod Touch, or your Windows 7 computer to regulate access to games on the App Store and on the web. But it is important to recognize that technology can only go so far and can never replace good parenting. Having the conversation with your child is equally important. As Parry concludes, the decision on what is appropriate for their child

should be made by the family, not the government. Luckily, the US Supreme Court agreed.

Meaning the onus, is on you and me.

If you are at ISTE 2010, make sure to stop by this ISTE Unplugged event on Tuesday, Jun 29 at 10:30 am.

Title: Individualized Instruction and Learning Using the iPod Touch

Description:
Comal ISD and Grey Culbreth Middle have implemented iPod Touch-based mobile learning programs. Middle schoolers who participate in these programs are each given an iPod Touch that includes restricted Internet access, apps, music, documents, presentations and instructional videos that allow the students to learn on their own time outside of school hours. The panelists will discuss how the programs evolved from concept to reality, cover acceptable use policy, security and deployment management, and anecdotal evidence of the benefits derived by students participating in the program.

• Comal ISD in New Braunfels, TX, has implemented a 1:1 learning program using the Apple iPod Touch for its special education English language learners.
• Grey Culbreth Middle School in Chapel Hill, NC has implemented a similar program for the entire 8th grade class.
• Travis Allen from the iSchool Initiative will also participate in the session and bring a refreshing student perspective.
• The session is hosted by Suren Ramasubbu (HuffPost blogger and CEO of Mobicip.com)

Panelists:

Suren Ramasubbu http://www.huffingtonpost.com/suren-ramasubbu

Sandra Shelton http://www.comalisd.org/mobile_learning/index.html

Travis Allen http://www.ischoolinitiative.com

Susan Wells http://www.youtube.com/greyculbreth

Click here to join the Elluminate room

Comal Independent School District in New Braunfels, Texas had identified a subset of the student population as English Language Learners (ELL). The district launched an ELL program for these students, as part of which each student was provided an iPod Touch. Given that the iPod Touch is an internet-enabled powerful computing device, the school had to overcome several challenges before they could deploy the solution.

Comal ISD decided to deploy Mobicip’s Safe Browser app as the window to the Internet on the iPod Touch. The Safe Browser app offers a safe, secure and educational Internet environment for school-age children.

“Mobicip fills a critical need for us. Students still have access to the Internet on any WiFi network and teachers and parents can feel confident that they are not accessing inappropriate sites.”, says Jennifer Wivagg, technology coordinator at Comal ISD.

Comal ISD has found Mobicipʼs solution to be effective, affordable and instrumental in enforcing CIPA compliance and implementing a managed one to one learning program using the iPod Touch, while allowing teachers to find innovative educational uses for safe and secure Internet access.

Click here to download the full case study.

A recent survey publshed by C.S.Mott's Children's Hospital on Children's health reveals that parents are very concerned about internet safety for their kids. 62% of Parents monitor their kids’ internet and 48% use filtering services or tools to protect their kids from inappropriate material and online threat. Among parents with kids on the Internet, nearly 1 in 3 are “very concerned” about online sexual predators, and 1 in 5 are “very concerned” about the loss of privacy and with their children viewing pornographic material.

Parents were asked if they take specific actions to protect or monitor their children’s use of the Internet. Overall, parents report the following actions:

• 65% disable pop-ups

• 62% monitor social networking sites

• 61% check history of websites

• 49% block websites they don’t want kids to use

• 32% use child-safe software

68% of parents report taking 1 to 4 of the above actions, while 19% take all 5 the of the actions listed. However, 13% of parents whose children access the Internet report not taking any of these actions to protect or monitor that use. Although most parents are taking some actions to protect their kids online by using filtering services like Mobicip or similar, some are taking no action and many others may not be certain how effective different strategies are.

There are many resources available for parents to educate themselves about internet safety. Here are a few: www.fbi.gov/publications/pguide/pguidee.htm

www.wiredsafety.org

www.filteringfacts.org

www.netfamilynews.org

Parents are a weak link in the chain of defences intended to safeguard children from online sexual predators, says the senior policeman responsible for child protection on the internet.

Too many parents prefer to hide behind technological ignorance rather than engage with advice about how to protect their children from internet threats.

Jim Gamble, head of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP), told The Times that parents talked about the need to keep children safe online but did not act on the advice available to them.

To read the full article, go here http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/crime/article6823929.ece

Linda Criddle from ilookbothways.com has written an article on how to choose devices for school kids keeping internet safety in mind. To read the full article, go to http://bit.ly/sVqwF

Here is an excerpt.

Laptops:

1. Don’t skimp on security and safety software. Install all the safety tools your child needs, such as antivirus, anti-spyware, a firewall, and age appropriate filtering tools. Remember that installing these tools is not enough – you must update security and safety software regularly to protect against new threats. Select auto-update settings to ensure the highest level of protection. Technology Tools
2. Leverage the safety settings within the services. Every service should have settings that allow you to limit exposure to others or to types of content. Browsing and searching
3. Protect your student’s laptop from theft. Laptop theft comes in two forms – theft of the information on the laptop, and theft of the laptop itself.
   1. To protect against information theft help your child establish a strong login password and teach him or her to log-off (password protect) the laptop whenever the laptop is left on its own.
   2. Laptops are easy to steal if left unattended for even a moment. Consider buying a laptop cable lock, so your child can physically lock it to something such as a desk. These locks typically cost between $15 and $35 dollars – far less than a replacement laptop.
4. Review the laptop’s features for safety. Of all laptop features, webcams are particularly problematic. Children often show poor judgment about the live video images they share. If the laptop you purchase has a webcam, set specific guidelines about how and when it can be used. Using webcams

Cell Phones:

1. Most cell phones today are small computers. In the same way you evaluate the online services and features your child can access on computers, you need to understand the phone’s features and the Internet services can their phone can access. Using mobile phones
2. Ensure that there are safeguards in place to protect your child. Does the phone have content filters? Can features be turned off?Using mobile phones What additional safeguards does the carrier provide? (Don’t be shy about asking and demanding answers).
3. Choose between a prepaid versus a monthly plan. Many parents like the financial accountability that a prepaid plan provides for their teens, however these plans usually don’t provide you with information about your teen’s calling activity like monthly plans do.
4. Understand how to track phone usage problems.
   1. If your student is overly tired in the mornings or is sneaking out at night, check the times of day that calls and text messages are occurring (monthly cell phone bills provide this information). If there is a problem, solve it by taking charge of the phone at bedtime and returning it in the morning.
   2. Check for inappropriate use during school hours: when texting and cheating can be issues. Address these directly by establishing clear consequences.

 According to a study from MSN, more than half of teens frequently surf the web without any supervision. The research into online habits of 20,000 teenagers in Europe also revealed that 29 percent had been bullied online.

European Commission has unveiled new safety guidelines designed to protect youngsters online. The guidelines have been signed by a number of popular websites, including Facebook, Bebo and You Tube. The firms have agreed to implement steps that protect youngsters, such as including a “Report Abuse” button online and making the profiles of under 18s private by default.

To read the complete article, go to http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.cfm?NewsID=110647.

iPhone 3.0 COMMENT: Age Controls Don’t Cover Internet Surfing

Apple has announced new iPhone/iPodTouch parental control features available in version 3 of the iPhone and in iTunes 8.2 that allow parents to choose the age of the user and whether or not to allow app downloads and allow parents to shut off Internet browsing capability to protect their kids safe from inappropriate Internet content. While these are steps in the right direction, it’s important for consumers to know that these new features do not allow parents to monitor the Internet browsers—short of blocking it completely.
 
Suren Ramasubbu, President and CEO of Mobicip, explains:
 
“Apple’s new parental controls are too extreme for many parents because they only allow parents to completely disable Internet browsing to keep their children safe from inappropriate content and online predators.  But parents also have the option of third party content filtering solution that works with the age controls on the iPhone and iPodTouch to allow their children to surf the Internet safely.”
 
One parental control solution on the market comes from Mobicip a company that is to helping parents protect their children from a new wave of Internet hazards stemming from mobility. Available for $4.99 from the iPhone App Store on iTunes, Mobicip Safe Browser and Mobicip.com service for the iPhone and iPod Touch that defines filtering levels based on U.S. education system recommendations for in-school Internet filtering.  Parents enable it by registering for the free account on the Mobicip Web site and setting content restrictions at one of three levels: elementary, middle or high school. More information is available at http://www.mobicip.com.