School Web Filters

[wolfkitty42]

Hello everybuddy! I have been thinking a lot about web filters recently, and I wanted 2 see if anyone was interested in discussing them. I think that web filters are an important and necessary way 2 keep children safe on the internet, but I think a lot of the current implementation that I have experienced has felt overbearing or like a violation of privacy.

I think the biggest pro is that a content filter can be good 4 young children. Especially with how early kids are getting internet access these days, I think it is a good idea 2 have a safety net that blocks inappropriate websites or social media. I think parents should be involved with their kid's internet time around this period. Making internet time family time also makes it easier 2 teach internet safety.

I think filters like this stop being beneficial and begin being harmful 4 teenagers. As long as someone reaches their teens with decent internet literacy, they'll probably be mostly okay. I think it can be more harmful, especially in a school setting 2 block things like games. We need 2 learn how 2 focus on an assignment, and divide up our work-time and fun-time. A computer is a tool, and learning 2 juggle its distractions with efficiently completing work is an important skill.

Schools and parents have slightly better logic towards blocking algorithmic social media, mainly because of how addictive it is. That is a problem out of the school's scope. Schools are also legally required 2 block explicit websites, and I don't see a particular issue with that.

Another issue that I have with web filtering is its usage as spyware. All of the systems I have experienced installed on school devices also function as spyware. Currently, the system at my school allows parents 2 sign up 2 see what websites their kids visit. I think that this is a gross violation of privacy, and can be a risk 4 students who might use school devices 2 access resources 4 sexual health or queer education. Some schools also just straight up block these sites. My school district is generally pretty progressive. While it isn't an issue I have faced, it has occurred in other schools and is extremely worrying.

But... At a certain point, I gotta admit.... I have another reason 2 want an unfiltered internet! It's FUN! I like browsing, and seeing whatever I like! I love 2 surf the web, and have fun. I mean, all work and no play makes little Timmy a hobbyless boy, right? School is a place 2 learn about the world, about its history, and about how 2 live in it today. The internet is such a huge part of the world, and I wish my school had a more free web 2 visit.

But what's your experience with this topic? When you were in school, did you have an internet filter? If you are in school, what is your filter like? What do you think?
Have a good night/day everybuddy... I'd love 2 hear your thoughts on the matter! :D

[wygolvillage]

Filtering and monitoring the internet access of children is used as an abuse tactic more often than not. I am a bit biased because I was subjected to this as a teen but I feel very strongly about it.


Filtering something just makes kids more determined to seek it out. Internet users should be armed with the knowledge to protect themselves rather than have things obfuscated or barred from them. Everyone deserves the right to privacy- including children.

[KibbehTheKib]

while I think internet filters are well-intentioned, in having experience with both filtered and non-filtered internet, I've found them pretty ineffective. either kids find workarounds to the filter itself ... (like, I remember getting around a youtube ban by clicking serebii.net's embedded videos and watching the recommended vids at the end) ... or else, they find less safe alternatives riddled with ads and viruses - stuff they won't be able to protect against because these locked down pcs keep you from getting an adblocker. and like you said, these filters are often invasive or block important resources all under the guise of "protecting children."

I think what's more important than keeping The Bad Stuff out of kids' eyes is making sure that, when they do stumble onto something they shouldn't, they feel comfortable talking about it with a trusted adult. that means making it a habit to talk openly with them about what they're up to online, and not punishing them if they accidentally run into something that's not kid-friendly. like, my parents were strict about not talking to strangers online, but that didn't stop me from doing it. all it really meant was that I never talked to them about it, because it could've meant losing my only friends at the time. if I had met someone who turned out to be malicious back then, would I have told them, knowing that risk? I don't know.

idk how my opinions would change if I were growing up in the current day, though. the internet is a lot more centralized and social media is more a part of kids' lives than ever. so on one hand, they're less likely to stumble onto a shock site these days, but on the other hand, it's a lot harder to pay attention to what they're doing. talking to kids about what they've seen online isn't as easy when they're seeing hundreds of tiktok shorts every day! plus, there aren't as many dedicated kid-friendly sites as there used to be. I remember playing club penguin and webkinz and later chatting on pokemon forums with people my age, and I'm worried for the kids who don't have those kinds of spaces now. as much as I want to say "holy shit, get these kids off social media," is it possible or justified to make that choice when it means potentially alienating them?

idk, it's a difficult subject, and I can't imagine what it must be like growing up in the modern internet era. but as someone who's experienced both sides of the coin, my advice is just... talk to the kids in your life about what they're doing online. teach them to engage critically with what they're seeing. with how embedded the internet is in our lives now, I think that's about the best we can do.

[Spots]

There was an Internet filter part of the time that I was in middle school. I can't remember what year it was, but one of the teachers somehow convinced the school to disable the filters some time before I graduated. I think it was supposed to teach us about responsibility or something. The school blocked URLs and broad categories of sites, but it also prevented students from searching certain words on Google. While the filters were active, it was sort of a game to me to see if I could get around them. Even though we weren't allowed to search certain words, if we managed to find a questionable word that wasn't blocked, the results on Google Images were completely unfiltered (this was long before Google Images became completely censored like it is now). I also remember playing around with Google Gravity at the time and discovering that the word filters didn't apply to it, so I could search whatever I wanted and have image results rain down onto the page.

The part about these filtering systems being spyware aligns with my experience as well. My school used a program called "LanSchool", which let the teachers remotely monitor anyone's screen at all times. I remember playing Sift Heads in the computer lab once and the teacher popped a message up on my screen telling me to stop.

As far as home Internet use went, my parents never tried to filter anything. I've had pretty unsupervised Internet access since I was 12 or 13 and I don't think that was a good thing. I constantly stumbled across or sought out stuff that I absolutely should not have been looking at, which seems to be an experience that is pretty broadly shared by people who grew up on the Internet.

I don't really have a problem with schools blocking sites and monitoring how students use computers and the Internet. Schools have an obligation to keep students safe and the Internet is most certainly not a safe place. I think parents have a much harder decision to make, though. I remember how frustrating it was when my parents made any attempt to restrict my access to computers and the Internet, especially since all my interests and hobbies involved that stuff. Everything is online now, so cutting off someone's access to the Internet or certain parts of it is a big deal. This whole thing might be more of a systemic problem rather than an individual one, though. I think the ideal Internet would have no content recommendation algorithms whatsoever and would keep adults and children completely separate, but that's a whole different conversation.

[Rosaria Delacroix]

We had some rather rudimentary blocking systems when I was younger- and if I recall, by about early highschool they decided to phase them out. This was largely because students quickly discovered that using a VPN would allow them to bypass any of their site restrictions... but so did clicking on a link and spamming the refresh button. Or you could just simply use the guest wifi, meant for visitors to the school, or parents- and that was totally unrestricted. So it didn't really put up much of an imposition for kids who were determined to scroll through whatever.

There was also an issue of class division- if you owned your own laptop, you were welcome to bring it in- and that opened up a lot more possibilities for you to screw around, versus having to use the school provided Chromebooks that were babyproofed to a ridiculous degree while being stuffed to the brim with what really felt like spyware- the teachers could view what you were doing, and if I recall, also shut down or lock student access remotely. Obviously, kids who could afford their own device (or more like, their parents could buy them one) didn't have to put up with the invasive monitoring or restrictions- I know at least a handful of them took advantage of how this made cheating easier for them with regards to in class assignments.

Frankly, I had completely unfettered access to the internet from quite a young age. There weren't really any precautions taken in regards to that- since it was such new technology at the time, I was encouraged to be computer literate, as they assumed it would be important in the future, and it was taken for granted that I was a mature and smart enough kid to not get myself into too much trouble. I was given the very basics on safety- don't post your legal name, don't post pictures of yourself, don't hand out your address, etc, and let loose. I remember the case of Amanda Todd causing quite the uproar among school staff, and we had a few assemblies about online safety.

Broadly, I think it worked out alright? I am in the odd position where I wasn't given a smartphone until I was much older than when most of my peers got their hands on them, (which did lead to quite a lot of social ostracization and cyberbullying, ironically), but basically have always had access to a family desktop or personal laptop once I got a bit older. There were some things that in retrospect, I probably was worse off for seeing- (I had nightmares after accidentally finding pictures of harlequin fetuses, and those oldschool jumpscares with screaming creepypasta characters and scary, distorted faces) but I also would have never really gotten much exposure outside of a highly religious, highly conservative context without being able to noodle around and explore and talk to other people. Not even just strictly in an LGBT context, though that was a big part of it- even just speaking to boys and realizing that basically everything that I had been taught about how men were more or less out of control predatory animals (hence the need for strict modesty standards and chaperones) wasn't really true, and it was indeed possible for boys and girls to be friends without it needing to be romantic.

I think it's probably more effective to teach people about internet safety, and just generally have a strong rapport with your kid- so that you don't need to resort to doing crazy things like tearing apart their diaries, or violating their sense of trust by snooping through all of their personal messages or using keyloggers or whatever. If your child's too young to trust that they'll take to heart those lessons on internet safety, they're probably too young to be parking in front of the device anyways. I think a toggleable option for some sort of blurring or censorship of things like graphic gore or nudity is a good call, so that your adolescent doesn't get jumpscared by mutilated bodies or whatever while scrolling around for art reference images. Warnings on like, hey, this is meant for a mature audience, and age ratings or content warning systems like filtering tags on Archive of Our Own are also cool. And in games that kids mostly play, a censor filter for slurs or curse words makes total sense: no one wants to be called derogatory terms in like, Club Penguin, or whatever.

It's a difficult subject, since it can be so subjective- not every kid is going to be of the same maturity even if they are the same age. There are ways to use technology in a responsible, limited capacity, and then you have the parents who let their infants brainrot in front of Coco Melon on loop. Strong communication, and an understanding of where your child is at, is probably the best thing to lean into. I do think that the longer you can keep them away and off of social media, the better- and kids absolutely do not need to have a smartphone in hand: I'd hesitate to give a child a phone before highschool, personally. Highschool in general would be a good transition time, since they'll be naturally gaining more independence and complexity in their schedules- part time jobs, after school extra activities, hanging out with friends at the mall: as well as increasing expectations students will have access to their own personal electronics to complete assignments, even more so if they go off to university afterwards. I also think that the whole 'family desktop' thing, back when it was shared and in a common room, still is a decent setup for younger kids.

[PurpleHello98]

I was given basically unlimited Internet access from the age of 7 or so, which honestly surprises me as my parents are both pretty computer savvy and Internet savvy and have been on-line for a long time. But maybe it was different for them as I was mostly accessing the Internet through mobile devices rather than computers until my teenage years.

I was definitely exposed to some things on there that I shouldn't have seen at such a young age, and so I want to change that for my kids. I'm not going to block social media or anything (even though I don't want them having social media young), but I will block porn, as aside from being against it personally (for reasons that would take too long to get into here), I really feel like being exposed to explicit content at such a young age really warped my perception of men in ways that I'm still struggling with the effects of today. I really don't want my children to have to deal with the same effects. I think blocking porn at home/at schools is a good thing and I can't see any drawbacks whatsoever. Others have had different experiences, but honestly at my school there wasn't really bullying for not being on social media that I can remember. I mostly felt excluded for not having an iPhone, but only an iPod touch.

I think at schools, it's a good idea to block social media for younger students (like 6th or 7th grade) that are still learning to prioritize, etc., but once students get older, I think it'd be time to take the training wheels off and let them sink or swim, since otherwise they won't really learn.

I feel like I naturally feel like being very strict toward my children with regard to the Internet since my parents were so lax and it had a lot of bad consequences, but I have to remind myself of the good things. I definitely won't read through my kids' messages or Web history or anything like that (unless I suspect something really bad is going on) and I think I need to remind myself that I'm hopefully going to raise responsible kids who can more or less take care of themselves on-line, with some help from me. I'm definitely going to sit them down and have the porn talk, the social media talk, etc., though, and try and make my expectations and rules about the Net clear.