A few years ago Windows Vista had a very bulky and in-depth programme called Parental Controls. This programme offered parents quite a few extras and bobbins that they often didn’t use so it was cut down, botoxed and streamlined into the Parental Controls you find in Windows 7 today.
However, for those of you who miss the more intricate controls and more powerful management tools of the past, there is Windows Live Family Safety. Another mouthful from Microsoft – just don’t say it fast ten times after some wine.
This can be downloaded easily from the internet in a variety of different languages and lets you monitor their computer activity, choose the websites, games and programmes they can access, set times they can use the computer, and lock search engines into safe settings.
The controls can be manipulated according to the age of your kids and they tend to add new features every so often according to parent demand
Most popular search engines including, obviously, Microsoft’s Bing, are included in the SafeSearch feature. You can add kids via the Family Safety website, control which sites kids visit, and more. It is simple to set up and a doddle to adjust.
It interacts with Parental Controls in Windows but adds extra details like remote management, session reports, and approved contacts. With the latter, kids can only receive emails from people that you have allowed on their contact list and it can be extended to Messenger too.
Another great feature is the activity reports that outlines what your child is doing with the PC during their allocated time. So you can decide if they are allowed more time thanks to responsible uses – homework, learning, building skills – or less if they are spending all of their time online playing games.
Windows Live Family Safety also works perfectly on the latest ASUS netbooks, such as the ASUS Eee PC 1025, as you only need to have Windows 7 or Windows Vista with SP2, a 1.6GHz processor, minimum 1GB RAM and a 1024×576 resolution.