Online Safety for the Family: 3 Ways to Protect Your Kids Online

The Internet has become ubiquitous in modern life. Virtually everything we do in society, from commerce to entertainment to education, has some online component nowadays, making it nearly impossible for children to avoid. As a parent, it can feel like you're in a difficult situation. On one hand, you want your kids to broaden their horizons and enjoy all of the opportunities the Internet can offer them, but on the other, you understand that there are very real risks associated with being online.

To reconcile these feelings and truly put your mind at ease, you need to ensure that your family stays safe whenever they use the public Internet. Fortunately, there are software technologies available that can help you to do just that. Here, we'll highlight three innovative solutions and provide some insight into how they can help you protect your kids online.

A Parental Control App

One major concern with your children being online is the fear of the unknown. The Internet is an enormous place that contains all manner of things, many of which you might consider inappropriate. The issue is, of course, that you can't be with your children to supervise them every time they're online, and this is where the worry comes into play. However, with a parental monitoring app, you can overcome this hurdle.

Installing a monitoring app like fenced.ai on your children's devices will allow you to supervise their online activities remotely. It will enable you to see the websites they visit and even check their search history to gain a fuller picture of what they're getting up to online. Moreover, you can even set your application to send you real-time alerts for potentially inappropriate activities or content. When paired with content filtering and time limit settings, this can help you to closely track and control your children's experience to create a safe digital space for them.

Child-Friendly Search Platforms

If you are using a parental control app to monitor and control your kid's online experiences, you will likely want to take steps to ensure they never encounter inappropriate or harmful content, even by accident. A great way to do this is to have them use child-friendly search platforms.

A child-friendly search platform, such as KidzSearch for example, is designed specifically for children, meaning that it employs strong filters to block out any potentially inappropriate content. This ensures that your children's online experiences are safe and age-appropriate whenever they use the search engine. Moreover, these search platforms place a strong emphasis on their educational focus, meaning that your kids will always find results with genuine information value.

Additionally, using content filtering and DNS website blocking functionality, such as through your parental control app, you can restrict access to other types of search engines. This will allow you to ensure that your children always use the search platforms that you have approved for them.

A Virtual Private Network

The harsh reality is that cybercrime is rife nowadays. You as an individual need to take steps to protect yourself online, and that goes double for your kids, so putting a comprehensive cybersecurity solution in place is key. This is where VPNs work their magic.

By simply installing a free VPN Chrome extension on the browsing device your kids use, you can ensure that they can always browse safely. This is because a VPN will route their connection through a remote server, blocking the device's IP so that they can stay anonymous online. Moreover, the VPN will encrypt Internet traffic to and from the browser, ensuring that sensitive data can't be intercepted or exploited. In these ways, a VPN can provide a vital layer of insulation against the threat of hacking and other types of cybercrime.

Providing a Safe Online Experience for Your Family

The Internet has so much to offer nowadays, both for us and our kids alike, but the dangers of the Internet can make it difficult to feel at ease with the prospect of your children being online. Fortunately, by taking advantage of the right technologies, you can mitigate the inherent risks of online activity to create a better experience for them.

By utilizing parental monitoring apps, child-friendly search platforms, and Virtual Private Networks on your kid's browsing devices, you can create a digital space that is safe, secure, appropriate, and educational, ensuring that your kids get online the best from their time online.