Parental controls for iOS and Android, and security measures for secure access on YouTube, Facebook and Instragram

Internet and ICT have been part of our life for years, and our children have been born under its influence. In this sense, there are families that authorize their children to use the tablet or mobile phone, although it is important that children are previously educated in their proper use, the time of screens is controlled and limited and parental control systems are installed.

Today we are going to review the safety measures and navigation tips that offer the main social networks, as well as the parental controls of the iOS and Android systems, and we explain how to configure them before offering the mobile to your children.

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YouTube security

These are the preventive measures to protect our children when they navigate this channel, or when they decide to open their own account by uploading content:

  • Activate security mode or the age restriction. In this way, every time our child connects through their account, YouTube will block videos that contain foul or vulgar language, violent, naked images or suggestive sexual content and representation of dangerous or harmful activities.
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  • Cyberbullying Block. With this option parents can block any user when we consider that he is committing cyberbullying against our child. To do this, we must visit the profile of the user in question, and on the "More information" page activate the options that are located just below the flag.

  • Report harassment. In the YouTube Security Center you can report any security problem you have encountered, including cyberbullying. We may also mark any video with inappropriate content that we think may violate the rules of the YouTube community.

  • Moderate comments. If our child has his own YouTube channel, we must also pay special attention to the comments he receives, reviewing them before they are published or disabling his publication.

  • Monitor your child's behavior on YouTube. If your child already knows how to drive only on YouTube, teach him to create playlists and review them with him to know what kind of videos he sees.

Likewise, Youtube advises to periodically review the contents that our children publish on this network, check their reproduction history, their favorite videos and the channels to which they have subscribed. In this way, if we find something that arouses our suspicion we could intervene as soon as possible to avoid any major evil.

Instagram security

In the Guide for parents on Instagram they offer us the following safety tips if our teenage son wants to open an account (he must be at least 13 years old):

  • Manage privacy, so that the account is private and he decides who admits among his friends. It is also possible to delete followers and block those users with whom you do not want to interact. Blocking a user prevents the user from accessing the published photos and videos.

  • Manage interactions. Instagram gives the option to delete comments or allow / block comments from certain followers. It is also possible to hide offensive comments and use filters that prevent offensive phrases and bullying comments.

  • Manage time. It is possible to know how long we have been on Instagram with the option "See your activity". Likewise, it is possible to configure daily reminders to limit the time in this social network, or to silence the notifications for a certain time.

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Facebook security

As on Instagram, when our teenagers decide to open a profile on Facebook they must take into account the following tips provided by this social network:

  • Manage privacy settings so that they decide who can find them on the network and who can interact with them. It is also possible to manage groups of friends with different disabilities, or manually control who sees or comments on a particular publication.

  • In case of detecting users or content that violates community rules, we must report the account to Facebook.

  • It is also possible block anyone Send notifications or unwanted comments.

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IPhone Parental Control (IOS)

If you have an Apple device you will find the following configuration options, which will allow you to program your smartphone so that your child can use it safely:

  • Establish content and privacy restrictions.
  • Use the "Time of use" to access real-time reports on how long you use the iPhone, iPad or iPod touch and set limits for what you want to manage.
  • Prevent purchases in the iTunes Store and App Store.
  • Restrict the use of certain apps and integrated functions.
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  • Prevent the reproduction of music with explicit content, as well as movies or television programs with specific ratings. Apps also have ratings that can be set using content restrictions
  • Restrict Siri's web search.
  • Restrict Game Center.
  • Prevent web content: iOS can automatically filter website content with the goal of limiting access to adult content in Safari and device apps. You can also add specific websites to an approved or blocked list, or limit access only to approved websites
  • Allow changes to privacy settings, to control which apps have access to the information stored in the device or to the hardware functions.

With the Family option, it is also possible to create a family group of up to six people to share content and authorize purchases from iTunes, Apple Books and the App Store.

Android parental control

If you have a device with Android operating system, you can activate parental control in Google Play, which will allow you to restrict the content that can be downloaded or purchased from Google Play based on the user's maturity level.

The parental control operation varies according to the content:

  • Parental control for applications and games, which will allow you to select the highest content rating you want to allow to download and buy content.

  • Parental control for movies, which will allow you to select the highest rating you want to allow to rent, buy or play content.

  • Parental control for TV series, which will allow you to select the highest rating you want to allow to buy or play content.

  • Parental control for books, so you can't read or buy most books with sexually explicit content in the Play Store and Play Books applications.

  • Parental control for music, so you cannot buy music that content providers have marked as "explicit."

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