Mumsnet users share how you safeguard your children around digital technology in the home with Sky Kids

[EllieMumsnet]

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In this digital age devices such as: laptops, mobiles, tablets, game consoles and TV's all come second nature to many of our children as they are used frequently from a young age in the home. Although they can help children learn and play in so many amazing ways, it’s also important to keep them safe and ensure what they are viewing/playing is appropriate. With that in mind Sky Kids would love to know all the ways you try to keep your children safe when it comes to technology in the home and how you still allow a healthy/fun relationship with technology in your family.

Here’s what Sky Kids has to say: “At Sky, we care about helping to keep kids safe in the home. That’s why alongside parental controls on the Sky Kids App, we’ve also launched brand new Kids Safe Mode, where you can keep your Sky Q box locked in the Kids section, so when your kids are in charge of the remote they can only see and explore programmes that are appropriate for them. Wandering fingers won’t be able to adjust settings, delete non-Kids recordings or watch programmes made for grown-ups.”

Do you have timers on all the family’s devices to ensure that the children aren’t able to use them past a certain time? What about parental controls on your television? Or do you have kids safety modes on all the devices they use? Do you worry about what they’re able to access from their devices? Perhaps you encourage an open relationship with your children where you can all ensure everyone is watching age appropriate content/shows? Or maybe you use children specific apps on their phones, smart TVs or tablets so that you are sure they can only access things suitable for them?

Whatever the ways you keep your children safe when it comes to multimedia, share them on the thread below and everyone will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw.
MNHQ

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Our DS has a kindle fire kids edition and the parental controls on that are pretty good - only age appropriate content is allowed whilst giving him some degree of freedom to choose what he looks at or plays. there aren't many (possibly any) ad supported apps on there so the chances of him accidentally ending up looking at something unsuitable/paying for something are pretty negligible. Everything is password protected as well. we have also set up a screen time limit and he can't use the tablet beyond a certain time in the evening. If he does play games/watch videos on any other device (his dad's phone usually) he is supervised the entire time. We wouldn't leave him alone with Youtube kids or anything like that for example as it doesn't seem to be properly curated at all.

We also have a profile set up specifically for him on Netflix so he doesn't come across anything unsuitable there either and he only watches tv with us on the family tv (and so far hasn't shown any curiosity in trying to work the buttons himself!). I'm sure it's going to get more difficult to know how to monitor him online and/or encourage safe online behaviour as he gets older (I am already looking at installing child-safe browsers on our pcs etc and would rather DS never discover social media at all!), especially as I think it's important to strike a balance between keeping children protected and allowing them the freedom to work things out for themselves. I know I definitely encountered stuff I was too young for when I was a kid (and it never did me any 'arm) but the problem these days is the prevalence of and ease of access to more extreme or inappropriate content especially on smartphones which seem much more difficult for parents to "police".

We only let my daughter watch YouTube on the big telly.

Parental controls and passwords :)

I'm doing a project on safeguarding our kids on the internet. if you could spare a couple of mins filling in this survey I'll be so grateful!!
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We use a timer on the iPad (Tumbletap) and had to change that from 1234 because I was not very subtle with that! We do you the Sky Kids app, which has great security settings for peace of mind.
And we never let him watch upstairs.

Sky has the worst controls ever, so bizarre they are flogging this on MN. Nearly all the other providers have possibilities to control device access, timers, etc.

Sky are actually going backwards! The new Q routers can't even prevent device access.

And if you look at Sky Community Forums, parents are constantly flabbergasted at Sky's useless controls. All you can basically do is control Adult Content or not through Shield, which is a caveman level of technology control. Its also completely irresponsible of Sky not to put resources into this, they have totally neglected the need for parents to be able to control their kids access to wifi! If my children were younger, I would never get Sky as a result of their poor or non-existent controls.

Passwords and pin codes for everything!

All technology looked at downstairs no tablets or TVs or phones in bedrooms. Seems to keep them under observation. Oldest is only 10 however so I'm sure there are battles to come.

GotToBeThere - isn't it the parent's responsibility?

no youtube- only apps that have zero adverts eg- kids iplayer- hopster

Supervised screen time, parental controls and checking their phone etc as they get older. Limiting time online to specific periods.

I allow my daughter (6) one hour of tablet time per day. She has an amazon fire tablet and has the amazon kids app, so I know the content is safe for her to see.

My son who is 4 doesn't own a tablet or go on our phones, he only watches what we put on the shared TV for him. He does get to choose from a selection of Movies on Sky and Netflix shows too!
We occasionally let him cast youtube from our phones with our supervision and do not let the videos autoplay so after the video he has chosen is finished it doesn't auto play another random video and we carefully select videos he has seen before or from verified accounts such as Ryans toys review.

I only let my children use the iPads whilst I’m sitting with them. They are aware of dangers that I regularly tell them about.

All tablets have password's and parental controls.

We have a tablet which has a passcode the children don’t know so they always have to ask to use it. My eldest has a phone but it has strict parental controls on it and she’s not allowed it after a certain time (it basically stops working) and she has to show it to us whenever asked.
They never use the internet without supervision but currently don’t need to use it for homework etc so I can see thisightbget harder as hey get older!

We don't have any parental settings on the tv yet but they are only 4.5 and baby age so no unsupervised access to it.
The iPad however is pretty much solely used by ds and is as locked down as it possibly can be.
I worry about YouTube even though he only uses the kids one, especially after recent events in the press so he's only aloud on it when sitting with us.
We also have regular chats about what he's watching and tell him he must talk to us if he sees anything scary etc.

Two of them got tablets for Christmas after I tested the Amazon fire kids tablet and we all loved it, meaning they all now have one. I use the parental controls on that but they are still supervised when using them, I like how it can be set to have to do educational things first before they can play

I've not seen any controls on TV, other than password for 18 rated films, but I'd be interested in them. I do monitor what they watch, I'm with them while they pick something and it's at a volume I can hear and zone in and out to when I'm doing other things.

Download what he is going to watch and then take the internet off til the next time I download something! It's the only way to stop his wandering hands!

We have parental controls and restrictions on everything and any time our 5 year old uses any technology it is in the living room with supervision. He does not own anything like a tablet of his own so will sometimes use the laptop for a school site, the Xbox and sometimes our smart phones.

Teens with time restrictions on phones laptops and content too

I’ve only just switched off parental controls on my son’s mobile..... He’s 21 now!

Setting time limits so they can sse how much time they had left.

I deleted the YouTube app ages ago and they haven’t even mentioned it since. They rarely ask to use the tablet and when they do it’s ybder supervision. Children are 6 and 4. They are allowed to watch Netflix but again completely under supervision and they aren’t allowed to even switch it on when we aren’t in the room with them.