How to Block Adult Sites for Kids

As a parent and a member of your family, you may not want certain sites to be accessible to kids or even grown ups on your household.

In today’s age, when everyone has their own devices, keeping a tab on everyone’s online activities is quite hard. Surely, you can make a set of rules to be followed. Here are some general tips that may be helpful.

Educate Your Kids About Online Safety

• Have open conversations with your kids about online safety and setting boundaries on what sites they visit. Establish shared guidelines.
• Use parental control features built into your operating systems and devices. All major platforms like Windows, iOS, Android have options to restrict access.
• Install family safety apps or DNS filtering services designed to block unsuitable material. Research reputable services.
• Enable safe search settings on browsers, YouTube, and search engines to filter explicit results.
• Place internet-connected devices in open family areas rather than private spaces.
• Set screen time limits on devices to control exposure.
• Monitor browsing history periodically, with your child’s knowledge.

The most effective strategies involve education, communication, and mutual understanding.

Despite doing all this, but content, not suitable for kids, will still find its way to their devices. This is why you need to use solutions available to block these websites.

Using DNS Filtering for your Home Wi-Fi

DNS (Domain Name System) filtering allows you to block certain websites and content by routing domain requests through a filtered DNS server.

Rather than connecting directly to the website’s IP address, requests first pass through the filtering DNS which can deny access.

Benefits of DNS Filtering

Some benefits of setting up DNS filtering on your home WiFi include

• Blocking access to inappropriate, dangerous or distracting sites like pornography, gambling, etc.
• Safeguarding children from viewing adult content and predators.
• Increased privacy by blocking ad trackers and malware domains.
• Ability to set filtering rules and whitelists for each device.
• Works across all connected devices and browsers that use the WiFi.
• Many free and paid filtering server options.

How to Set Up DNS Filtering

To enable home DNS filtering, you’ll need to:

1. Choose a filtering DNS provider like OpenDNS Home or CleanBrowsing.
2. Configure your router’s DHCP settings to assign the filtering DNS servers rather than your ISP’s servers.
3. Set your router’s DNS settings itself to also use the filtering servers.

With the right DNS filtering service configured on your home router and WiFi, you gain better control, security and privacy across your networked devices.

Do it on Individual Devices

If you don’t want to put restrictions on the entire home network, you can block sites, on individual devices.

For Android Devices

Go to your Android phone’s settings. Search for Private DNS and open it. Tap on Private DNS and type in DNS Provider Hostname ‘family-filter-dns.cleanbrowsing.org‘. Save it. Now, no adult website will open.

For Apple Devices

To set this in your iPhone, go to Cleanbrowsing.org/filters Scroll down and tap on Family Filter. Here, you have to do Download Configuration. Press Allow.

Then, go to iPhone’s settings. Go to Profile Download and tap on Install. Install again and done. No wrong websites will open.

If your kids are under 13 years of age, and they have their own devices, you should consider creating their Gmail accounts, which will let you control ther devices as parents. It has more control than just blocking unwanted sites. Check out detailed article.