Safe Surfing Programs

Commercial programs are available that screen out or block objectionable sites on the Internet. Common features of these programs are that they have a data base of sites that are considered objectionable. You can add to or delete sites from this data base. Some programs will not allow certain words to be chosen for searches, or will screen out sites that contain certain words. (One such program screened out the White House because it contained the word "couple"!) The programs protect the system with a password and allow you to set ground rules for time on-line by total hours or time of day.

You should definitely do comparison shopping on these programs because they have many different features. The book Safe Surfing has a comparison of a number of these tools.

As a teacher you should know that many students can "break" or disable these programs. Thus the bottom line is that you and your school design some systematic way to be sure that students know and understand their responsibilities as online users.

For some examples of programs available go to these sites.

Cyber Patrol
CyberSitter