I have four children ranging in ages from 19 to 4 1/2, and everything in between. I have 1 child in college, 1 in high school, 1 in elementary school, and 1 in pre-school. Add to the chaos of each child going in opposite directions every day to my own schedule of owning 6 blogs, 2 non-profits, 15 websites, doing transcription work, and writing my third book, you could say I'm pretty busy.
Luckily, I have really good kids. For the most part, they stay out of trouble and do the right thing. However, our family is very much entrenched in the digital age. I spend a LOT of time on the computer for my various jobs. Jacob, my youngest, has special needs and uses a variety of programs and apps for therapies, communication and such. My 6-year old LOVES the Sesame Street web page, and my 15-year-old is obsessed with World of Tanks.
Although I trust that my children are good and they're doing good things while on their various electronic devices, I cannot say as much for the different advertising agencies that market to children on the websites that they visit. It's infuriating to see what occasionally pops up as in-app marketing on my 4-year-old's game designed for 3+ years of age.
So, when I was approached to check out a program called Familoop, I immediately checked it out. The premise of this program is to allow you to go in an monitor what is happening on your computers, Ipads, phones, etc. You see which websites are visited, for how long, when it occurred, e-mails that are being sent (if you're worried there is sexting going on, or conversations with individuals you don't trust, etc).
At first, I was unsure about the privacy issues. Was I invading my family's privacy by spying on their digital footprint and seeing what they are doing? Then, I realized that in order for this program to work, I needed to download a program to each device. That means if I wanted to download Familoop to my son's Iphone, I needed to get the phone from him (which would automatically illicit a response of 'why?'). This gave me the opportunity to discuss Internet predators, porn being targeted at kids, etc. as well as giving him a heads-up that he was being watched. It's like having 'mom' in the room at all times. You'll be on your best behavior.
I did, however, add the program to my own personal computer that the family has access to. However, I didn't tell anyone that it was there. Call it morbid curiosity. After a couple of weeks, I went into the Familoop hub and checked out the activity on my computer. I am happy to report that nothing unusual or questionable was reported.
What peace of mind to know that I didn't have to block any sites, or have any talks with my family over the sites they were visiting, etc.
So, if you're looking for a program that will enable you make sure your kids aren't going to any sites they shouldn't, or are sending/receiving texts they shouldn't this is the program for you. It was easy to set up, easy to understand, and easy to implement.
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