The Internet has become an integral part of our lives and, more recently, our children. With the complex COVID-19 situation, online learning and entertainment seem to be the obvious and compulsory choice.
So how can parents protect their children from inappropriate content on the Internet? There are many ways to reduce the risk of children accessing harmful content online, but in this article, CyberPurify will help parents how to set up parental control on Google Play most effectively.
How to set up parental control on Google Play
For family members who manage their accounts
You follow the following steps:
- Open the Google Play app.
- At the top right, tap the profile icon.
- Tap Family Settings Parental Controls.
- Turn on Parental Controls.
- To protect parental controls, create a PIN that your child does not know.
- Select the type of content you want to filter.
- Choose how to filter or restrict access.
Parental control settings only apply to the Android device you’ve added the feature to. To add parental controls on another device, you need to repeat the steps above.
For family members with accounts created with Family Link
You follow the following steps:
- Open the Family Link app.
- Select your child’s account.
- Tap Manage Control settings on Google Play.
- Tap the content type you want to filter.
- Choose how to filter or restrict access.
If your child’s Google Account is managed with Family Link, you can set up parental controls for your child. This control works on Android devices where your child is signed in to their Google account. Parents in the family group need to use their Google account password to set up or change parental control settings for their child.
How parental controls on Google Play work
How parental controls work varies across categories: Apps & Games, Music, Movies, TV, and Books. Parents should note that these parental control settings for individual content types are not available in all countries.
Apps & Games
When setting up parental controls for apps and games, you can choose the highest rated content you want to allow your kids to download or spend money on.
However, your child will still be able to see apps and games outside of the filter you’ve set up if your child intentionally searches or visits them with a direct link to the app’s page.
Parental controls don’t change the games you see in the Play Games app, including games you’ve purchased or recommended. If your child tries to install a game through the Play Games app, your child will be taken to the Play Store app, where parental control settings can restrict your child’s access.
Movie
When setting up parental controls for movies, you can choose the highest-rated movies you want to allow your kids to rent, buy, or playback. However, your child can still watch movies outside of this setting when your child intentionally searches or accesses such content via direct links.
If movies are restricted because of parental controls, you won’t see them in the Play Store app or the Play Movies app, even if you’ve rented or purchased them.
TV
When you set up parental controls for TV shows, you can choose which shows with the highest ratings you want to allow your kids to buy or replay. However, as with movies, your child can still watch TV shows outside of the filter if they intentionally search by keywords or by accessing them via direct links.
If TV shows are restricted because of parental controls, you won’t see them on the Play Store app or in the Play Movies app, even if you bought them.
Book
When parental controls are set up for book genres, your child won’t be able to read or buy most porn books from the Play Store and Play Books. However, as with movies and TV shows, your child can still view books outside of the filter you’ve set up when your child intentionally searches by keywords or by accessing them via direct links to the content page.
While setting up parental controls won’t filter out 100% of porn in Google Play, this feature will help your kids reduce the risk of exposure to adult content.
Use parental controls to block adult content
If you share your Android phone or tablet with your kids, you can enable parental controls to block downloading or purchasing content based on how mature the content is. Several ways to set up parental controls for each type of content such as apps, games, TV shows, and books which has been shown daringly above.
You should take advantage of available tools to set up parental controls on your child’s device to filter out harmful content, limit the use of the device, or some other features for children such as no in-app purchases. You may need some online safety tips to keeping kids safe online during COVID:
- How to set up parental controls on Macbook
- How to block porn sites on Google Chrome
- How to block porn sites on Safari
- Set up parental controls for Microsoft Edge
- Set up parental controls for Youtube
However, you don’t always have time to adjust each setting for your child, besides, the tools available can only protect your child within Google Play while other websites which your kids access every day carry a very high risk of snooping harmful content.
To ensure your child’s online environment is safe and healthier, you should consider using an additional online content filtering tool – considered by many parents as one of the best free parental control software to hide 15 types of harmful content on the Internet, including:
- Pornography
- Horrifying content like gore, accidents, ghosts, violence, murder, terrorism, etc
- Content about stimulants, addictive substances such as alcohol, beer, marijuana, drugs, etc
- Content with aggressive elements, hurting others like Hate speech
This free porn blocker extension can help to minimize your child’s access to harmful content, ensuring a healthy online environment for your child but at the same time, not invading their privacy rights.
You can see more articles about best parental control app.
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