Pow Distribution Cybersitter 2000

If you have children, a computer and a modem in the house, you might think twice before leaving them alone in a room together. Of course, you want to encourage your children's independence in exploring the internet for homework and fun, but you don't want them to accidentally come across obscene, upsetting or otherwise unsuitable material.

Nor do you wish to imply that you don't trust them by looking over their shoulder all the time to check they're not deliberately hunting out such sites. The solution is to get a discreet filtering program like Cybersitter 2000. Cybersitter is incredibly easy to set up - you choose all your settings from straightforward dialogue boxes that are all easily accessed from the Cybersitter Control Panel.

Setting the filters to block out unsuitable websites is simplicity itself. A long list of filters will be put in place automatically, but you can reset any of these. The list contains obvious topics such as pornography, violence, cults, gambling, the occult and so forth. Other net nasties that you may wish your child to avoid - including personal ads, hacker sites, online chat and even Pokemon - can also be excluded.

There are also a few other handy little features. You could, for instance, limit internet access to certain days and times, whether this is for the sake of your phone bill or your child's health. You can have the program log any attempted violations of the security settings and you can even set the System Snooper to check over the PC for dubious material.

It can get things wrong, however. For example, it could block a site that you feel is acceptable or it may allow an unacceptable site. But you can tackle this with the custom filter settings which let you ban or allow particular sites.

The proof of the program is in the browsing, however. Of course, you'd need to try out a program like this over a lengthy period to get a true picture of its abilities, and it should not be seen as a catch-all solution to a particular problem.