Windows Phone 8 Parental Controls

[malienglez]

I have bought a Nokia 620 for my 11 year old son. I am a bit disappointed by the lack of parental controls on the Windows Phone, and lack of such tools in the Marketplace. My main concern is completely unrestricted access to the internet. I know I can install a filtered browser (AVG Family Safety). However, that is useless unless I can also remove or at least block or hide IE10. Is there any way to uninstall, block (e.g., behind a password) or hide IE10 on the phone?

If not is there any other software or methods I can use.

By the way unfortunately I live a thousand miles away from my son and my ex wife is a techno muppet so I cannot get good visibility on what is happening

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Best Regards

Paul

 

[markfive]

The built-in controls, including those available via https://familysafety.microsoft.com/safety/default.aspx are very limited. It's definitely an area for improvement.

Some carriers have content filters that can be switched on for children's phones - here in the UK they have to provide this service and it's switched on by default.

There's no way to disable IE10, so Wifi connections might still allow unlimited access.

Sorry there's no simple answer, it's definitely an area that's lacking at present but it's also an area I can't see MS leaving wide open because they've quite a fairly strong offering for Windows 8.

 

[Huime]

mark you are misleading paul.
try this Set up My Family on the Windows Phone website | Windows Phone How-to (United States)
If you want to turn the phone into a pure entertainment device you can even lock the main screen and setup to use for kids corner only. But I guess you dont want to lose the call capability.

 

[Bouc Bulldog]

Sorry Huime, but you've missed the point... in the same way as Microsoft!

I'm having exactly the same problem as malienglez with my 14 year old son. He had an iphone before, which was great for parental control, but he unfortunately wanted to switch to Windows Phone. I'm absolutely astounded that Microsoft's only concern is what content can be downloaded (as shown in Huime's "how to"). If the phone is connected to the internet via wifi it can access ANY content, and IE has no setting to restrict this! (And it's incredible the things a 14 year old will look at on internet if you don't keep control!)

I have set up Microsoft parental control on my boy's PC, and that works fine - the reports on what he's doing, at what time, internet searches, etc, is great, and even allows to block the access to the PC at certain times, or after a certain number of hours of use. Fantastic!

So if Microsoft can do that on PC's why are they doing nothing on Windows phones??? I've had to use my wifi router at home to block all internet connections on the phone, as it's the only (radical!) solution to this problem. If Microsoft think that kids playing 18-rated games they've downloaded to their phones is the worst thing they can get up to they have little knowledge of how teenagers work!

The other solution Microsoft propose is the "Kids Corner", but this is only of interest if lending your own phone to your kids. Seems they've not yet realised that a lot of kids have their own phone these days!

Come on Microsoft - fix this, and don't let me regret any longer my boy's choice to have gone from Apple to Microsoft!

 

[texas tk]

*sigh* same here...I stumbled on this thread while looking for a solution for my kid's lumia920...youtube being the biggest issue, though others close behind.

 

[Paul Lindqvist]

Yes windows phone parent control is in dire need of added features. Suggesting kids corner to a 11-year old is funny..

I recently bought a 630 for my 12-year old daughter and while downloading apps can be restricted, the rest is left uncontrolled.

Now to be fair her old Sony Xperia Go (jelly bean) was no better in this regards, in fact it was worse due to the fact one had to rely on buggy apps to lock apps and what not. Keep pushing the buttons and the app would crash and the phone was unlocked..

Apple is simply superior, i mean no need to setup different accounts etc. It's built into iOS.

 

[Murph15]

I bought 2 windows phones assuming they had parental controls.....very frustrated. I am going to try and get a refund and look for an Android phone because I can't lose any more HOURS/DAYS looking for parental controls.

 

[Jack David]

I think the phone has no functional that.