Safety and responsibility for children and young people should begin in their home. So, if a parent or carer asks for advice, ask what they should do to make access to the internet or from the device they gave to their child, safer.
Parents and carers may not be aware that there are parental controls offered by home internet service providers. These controls can make their home a safer online environment.
The biggest internet service providers in the UK have ‘Active Choice’, which asks new customers whether or not they would like access to adult content blocked.
If parents and carers want to ensure that their child is safe from inadvertently seeing inappropriate content, they need to check that they are using the best available settings at home.
Broadband
The following information shows you how to set up filters on home broadband to help prevent age-inappropriate content being accessed.
TalkTalk
TalkTalk HomeSafe’s parental controls have two categories: Kids Safe and Homework Time.
Kids Safe provides the facility to block specific websites, whilst Homework Time lets parents set a time to prevent access to social networking and gaming websites. You can find out more about these settings here:
BT
BT Parental Controls also offer a homework time feature and allow you to restrict access on all devices using your router.
You can find out more here:
Sky
Sky Shield allows you to age-restrict content and custom-block sites.
You can find out more about how to keep your family safe here:
Virgin Media
WebSafe allows you to set age categories on your network for users.
Find out more here: