You probably already know the fact that lots of kids love watching videos on YouTube whose a colorful, high-quality, fun, and friendly environment. But have you ever thought that your child has been watching inappropriate content on Youtube without your knowledge?
Nothing is completely safe, and neither are Youtube and Youtube Kids. Although the risk rate is low, children are still at risk of seeing nudity, violent content that is not appropriate for their age. Research shows that 27% of videos watched by children under 8 are intended for an older audience, with violence being the most likely type of negative content.
Therefore, parents need to proactively protect their children better through the following 3 ways to set up Youtube parental controls.
YouTube problems on online safety for kids
You also know the case of Logan Paul, a popular YouTuber with more than 15 million subscribers on his channel who posted a video on YouTube showing a body hanging from a tree in what is considered a forest in Japan with a ratio of high suicide rate.
Although YouTube eventually removed the video from its platform, before it was taken down, others copied, downloaded, or replayed it and it was still accessible. Paul’s action comes amid a flurry of complaints against YouTube for its alleged failure to protect children from inappropriate content.
In November, YouTube removed more than 150,000 videos from its site and turned off comments on more than 625,000 videos after investigators discovered the content and comments were directed at children.
And in some cases, the comments were made by predators who sexually assaulted children. YouTube also confirmed at the time that it had removed ads from about 2 million videos with content not suitable for children.
Not surprisingly, such findings have led many parents to question whether their children are safe to use YouTube anymore.
How do parents set up Youtube parental controls?
YouTube has removed or restricted reported inappropriate videos, which will usually take effect after a few hours. However, case-by-case content removal is not a suitable long-term solution to promptly deal with the massive amount of content generated every second, every minute, especially potentially harmful content targets at a younger and younger audience.
If not proactively blocked in time, just a few seconds of children exposed to harmful content on Youtube is enough to make them have nightmares and fear.
That is why parents should coordinate the use of the following internet safety tips.
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Set up restricted mode of Youtube
What is the restricted mode?
If you decide you want your kids to access YouTube but want to limit the content they can watch, you should enable Restricted Mode, which can be effectively used as Youtube parental controls.
However, keep in mind that this isn’t a perfect tool, and don’t assume that Restricted Mode will protect your kids from any harmful content. Because “Restricted Mode” functionality is partly dependent on users flagging content that may not be suitable for children and on moderators taking it down.
How to enable parental controls via Restricted Mode
- Go to YouTube.com, tap Sign In, and sign in to your Google account.
- Select your Profile icon in the top right corner.
- Look at the bottom of the menu: Select Restricted Mode.
4. Enable Restricted Mode.
5. After you enable this mode, Youtube will automatically reload the page and update this feature.
You can set parental control on YouTube with steps like these for Youtube app on mobile devices like iPhone and Android, you should know that changing settings in the browser won’t affect your account anywhere else. In fact, you’ll need to enable Restricted Mode on any machine where you want to filter adult content.
Set parental controls on YouTube Kids
Youtube Kids is a version of Youtube designed specifically for children, so the system will automatically filter and remove videos with adult or age-inappropriate content and only allow your child to watch those videos clips with content suitable for children.
You can download Youtube Kids for iOS here or for Android here.
After signing in with your Google account, you can create a personal passcode to access the app’s settings. The app allows configurations for up to 8 kids, each with their own avatar and settings, including time limits and a personal passcode for each child so they can’t access each other’s profiles.
You can also turn on/off the search function on Youtube Kids. If the search function is enabled, your child can search for more video content on Youtube Kids, and vice versa, your child can only watch the video content provided by the application, not allowed to search for themselves.
Besides you can set the screen time to limit your child to use the app. After the time is up, the app will lock itself and not let your child see it anymore, which will save them from spending too much time on this.
It’s important for you to decide if you want to let your kids search apps freely or rely on age-based content settings (under 4, 5–7, and 8–12) and video. which will be filtered to suit each age. Selecting “Content Approval” yourself turns off the search and instead shows Video Collections, which have been verified as age-appropriate.
Use online content filtering tools
Youtube Kids uses algorithms to filter out adult content and feed children’s content into Youtube Kids. But videos that don’t quite match can pass that algorithm.
Since the app’s launch in 2015, Google has improved its management efforts by using human monitoring to review videos flagged as inappropriate on YouTube and providing videos that are “verified” for Youtube Kids.
And as mentioned, no tool or technological product is 100% safe even if it is labeled for children, 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 follow the steps below:
- Open your browser: Google Chrome/Firefox/Microsoft Edge/Safari
- Click Add-ons/Extensions on browsers’ settings or you can click here Google Chrome Extensions or Firefox Extension or Microsoft Edge Extension or Safari Extension (Click Safari at the upper left corner => Click Safari Extension)
- Type the keyword CyberPurify in the search box (the pictures below take Chrome as an example)
4. Click on CyberPurify displayed in the results
5. Select Add to Chrome
6. Select Add extension
7. The result displayed as shown below is that you have successfully installed it.
Wise modern parents are always proactive in bringing the best for their children. To better protect your child from all porn sites, for all internet-connected devices your child use, you should pre-order Wifi Device, becoming the first parents to own the solution which 24/7 protects your kids from harmful websites. Best prices are always available for early birds!
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