Reviewing ContentProtect: A Web Filter

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I’ve been a user of ContentProtect for about a year and a half and can say that I like the way it filters offensive content. But there are also some things that I don’t like about it. I’ll tell you about them, but first let me explain what it offers.

ContentProtect (CP) is a Web filter (also known as parental control software) that is installed on your computer and serves as a gatekeeper to the Internet. It’s a software application that you install on your computer. When you launch your Web browser, it goes to work looking at content before it displays on your screen. If that content checks out as “okay” with the preferences you have set, then it shows up on the screen. If it doesn’t, then you are either prompted to enter or request an override, or are completely blocked from viewing that Web page.

It can do this filtering on a per user basis, with each profile defined to suit an appropriate age level and tech expertise. Or no profiles may be used and everyone is held to the same level of scrutiny you set.

Reporting is another great feature it delivers, so if you create profiles for each user in your family, not only can you see where they’ve been, but it also categorizes what type of site they’ve visited. Is the pie chart showing a large slice of enterainment-related sites? Maybe Timmy has been doing too much playing and not enough homework. :) You can, of course, manually enter sites to avoid or to deem worthy of visiting. If something’s not categorized like you think it should, no problem — just assign it to a new category.

Another thing I like is that it can send an email automatically to the parent (the administrator of the application) when someone has attempted to visit a site that’s off limits. It gives the URL of the site and the type of category it belongs to. You can also assign a different password for accessing the administrator’s panel, one to override a blocked site (if configured to allow for an override), and yet another to disable/uninstall the software. All that comes in handy because if you think your teen is responsible enough to have the override password, then you can give him just that password. So even if they did visit a site that was inappropriate it will still be logged in your reports.

Now, that’s the good stuff. Let’s get into the things that could be improved.

I used to like having profiles for each member of my family, but with the 2.0 version they have, if you want to use profiles you have to use the Windows logins. In other words, you have to set up a Windows account for each user and the username of each of those accounts has to match the username for the profiles you set in CP.

That sounds simple enough, but consider the following. I tried to accommodate this requirement, but found it unacceptable to the way my family and I use the computer. Logging into another Windows account takes a little bit longer to startup than logging into your own profile. Plus, if you want to have access to certain files from all accounts you have to go to a lot of trouble to create shortcuts to them or some other type of configuration. For me, this is its greatest weakness.

I spent a lot of time evaluating other parental control software packages simply because I was trying to avoid having to go to such lengths in order for CP to work properly on my computer. Every software package, no matter what it is, requires certain things to be present on your computer. But this is different; this one was requiring me to change the WAY I work on my computer.

Be that as it may, I’m still using it, but I’ve chosen to use the Default User option, which means I can no longer track where my kids are going on the Web on an individual level. I can tell where they’ve been, but I can’t tell who went there. Furthermore, my oldest child used to have certain rights to things she can access that the her siblings don’t. But now, because everyone is held to the same level of filtering, she has to ask for an override from my wife or myself.

Another few things that bug me about ContentProtect:

  • My DSL connection is pretty fast, but it seems that ContentProtect slows my Web surfing down somewhat. Remember, this is a software that is installed on your computer and is updated daily to tell it what the good and bad sites are. With it being on my computer you’d expect it to be faster not slower if you were to compare it to having to filter your Web content through a middleman on another server. The theory goes that if you have to go from point A (your computer) to point C (the site you’re trying to get to), but have to get there by going through point B first, then that will take longer. Having a filter on your computer is like bypassing point B, so it should be faster.
  • It’s not compatible with some popular software packages. For example, Google Web Accelerator is something it can’t handle. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I could make up for the slowness I was experiencing with using ContentProtect when I had this accelerator installed. But after speaking with their tech support and learned that it wasn’t compatible (which explained one of the problems I was calling them about), then I had to uninstall it. GRRR!
  • Another thing is that you have to tell ContentProtect to bypass a software I use: avast! antivirus. You can do this for all installed applications on your computer, which is nice, but I hear they’re working on configuring their next release to do this by default for some of the other popular packages. avast! is a free antivirus software that I’ve mentioned here before and dreaded the thought of having to uninstall it. Again, I’d be accommodating the makers of CP when it’s them who should be accommodating me.
  • ContentProtect updates daily, but can be slow. That, by itself, is not a problem and one that I appreciate. But bear in mind that you can’t access the Internet until it has completed its update. Now, I’m not talking minutes here, but it’s an annoyance to wait for the udpate to take place especially if it has already updated earlier in the day when I first turned on the computer. I mean, honestly, you’d think it would be smart enough to ask itself, “Have I updated today? I have? Okay, I’m going to not do it again until tomorrow.”

The most influential factor that kept me from jumping ship and switching to another filtering package was the fact that I had already paid for my subscription, which wouldn’t expire until late next year. However, even though I’ve had some annoyances with CP I must say that they have been reduced since I switched to using the Default User option it offers. So it’s a trade-off, really. It may be that I end up switching at some point before my subscription expires, but for now I think things are running all right. :)

Summary

Family, Internet Safety, Parents, Product Reviews


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