For God, Family and Republic

With the World-Wide Web growing strong since the early 1990s, it has brought a new plague of objectionable content onto the scene. It is quite is easy to unintentionally stumble upon something on the Internet that you're better off not seeing. And the best counterweight is to simply have a third-party filter either through the Internet provider on the server-side or a software-based option like Cybersitter. I couldn't conceptualize letting kids have Internet access without it.

Christian parents often seek to block out worldly influences, and pull the plug on premium pay TV like HBO, Showtime, Cinemax and MTV because of licenscentious entertainment that comes, especially on at night. So, why would you have the Internet as a free-for-all surfing environment? Filtering software eliminates temptation and accidental exposure. It is only a matter of time, that someone in the family accidentally clicks into something. Seemingly, trivial pursuits like software download sites or joke web sites may have offensive ads, offensive content, and links to offensive content. Time spent web surfing is the only prerequisite for the risk of exposure.

A few years ago before I went off to college, my father installed a free Internet provider called Free-n-Safe, which filtered on the server side. That Internet access service was discontinued. By that time, I was in Christian colleges, they filtered the Internet on the server side as well, on the dorms and at the library, and our network blocked out objectionable materials. The seamless integration on the server-side does sometimes seem advantageous, but software-based solutions can be just as effective.

Overall, I highly recommend this software. I got it and installed it sometime ago. It was the PC Magazine's Editor's Choice in August 2004 issue. CYBERsitter provides over thirty categories of filtering making it the most complete Internet filter available. The filters are updated automatically, and there are no subscription charges. A sophisticated "content recognition" system recognizes and blocks new objectionable web sites even before we know about them. In addition to a regularly updated list of filtered web sites, it has a concurrent measure that filters pages on the basis of objectionable keywords. Granted, the filters can be too strong initially on default settings where they block trivial keywords like death, and even things from BibleGateway.com. Before you start, you usually have to tinker with it and find the optimal settings, but they offer support. It also can screen and record chat conversations which maybe useful to parents keeping an eye on their teenagers, which is a good thing I guess.

If you search for it on EBay odds are you can find a new copy for $25-30.