I have the Microsoft safety shit on, and I made every site they can go to a web app. My router blocks nsfw/nonkid traffic. My phone gets notifications when they do anything at all.
And I have extensions blocking all nsfw sites just in case. And I’ve nuked the entry for any web browser on their start menu and task bars. Can’t even scroll to find it. If you open it, it requires my admin PW, which is 14char #$@-123-ABC so good luck turds.
Steam is locked down in kid mode - also they just play Roblox or cool math games anyways lol. Steam has browser disabled.
Only things they have access to is Bing.com with their signed in kid account. And coolmathgames.com.
It took about a week on and off to setup and I just did the two laptops in tandem. Windows 11.
My parents and school administrators’ attempts at blocking unsanctioned activities is what taught me computer literacy
There was nothing quite as satisfying as getting caught opening addictinggames on a web browser through a proxy when the teacher was convinced they had blocked it completely.
My son’s group in middle school hosted their own proxy overseas. They then pirated a whole bunch of educational videos that the teachers liked to use and made nice clean interface. The games pages had no direct links on the educational videos screens. They had to type in the the page directly in the URL.
So the teachers all loved the site and gave the official “approved for all students” bypass on the districts Chromebooks. The kids had uninterrupted access to all their games.
The kids were smart enough to keep the location of the games to students with a B or higher GPA. Most of the teachers turned a blind eye to them playing games when they did get caught. The games pages also had a home button that sent the students screens to a random educational video. I was truly impressed with their clever approach.
The IT department either never caught on or enjoyed the games themselves because its still up and they are all in highschool now.
I remember when proxies were easy to find and you could get to the most ridiculous stuff. We had college intern system admins for IT at our HS so it was easier to get by alot of things most of the time.
A friend and I became unofficial TAs for a high school computers class when we defeated the remote-viewing software and any web blockers, we knew more than the poor teacher and it was easier to let us do what we wanted if we promised to help other kids do the actual lessons.
That network had terrible security. So many important files stored as unprotected text in the intranet.
Yeah, I found Microsoft family to be a pretty half-assed experience. The thing that seems to work best is the screen time management. I had planned to try and set up YouTube access via allow listing channels in a home Linux server, but it turns out that YouTube doesn’t identify their videos by channel in the URL and I’d have to allowlist every single video for a given channel.
I’m planning on building a server that rips channels videos and they can have the app for that.
We are a no YouTube without our explicit permission on the video kinda household. Too much actual brainrot. And as much as I don’t like Television, at least my kids are mentally protected from bullshit with the Children’s Television Protection Act.
You could theoretically host a Piped API instance, and use it to get channel info. I guess you are already using your own SSL certificates, judging by what you are trying to accomplish.
I’m not a sysadmin, I’m a backend dev with enough network knowledge to be dangerous. I’ve set up exactly one super basic website, so I know some of this stuff, I just have to (and can and will) stumblefuck my way through it. This seems like a really great idea, I had no idea Piped could potentially handle that. I’m going to keep an eye on this, thanks!
Yea, my job at work now is to do this but all day lol.
I build my network/firewall/and shit and then go around trying to break as much shit as I can so I can fix it.
fellow tech dad here. how did you strike the balance between “look up shit online” and “hiding the terrors and lies of the internet from my kids”?
Mine’s still little, but knowing sooner is better.
I have the Microsoft safety shit on, and I made every site they can go to a web app. My router blocks nsfw/nonkid traffic. My phone gets notifications when they do anything at all.
And I have extensions blocking all nsfw sites just in case. And I’ve nuked the entry for any web browser on their start menu and task bars. Can’t even scroll to find it. If you open it, it requires my admin PW, which is 14char #$@-123-ABC so good luck turds.
Steam is locked down in kid mode - also they just play Roblox or cool math games anyways lol. Steam has browser disabled.
Only things they have access to is Bing.com with their signed in kid account. And coolmathgames.com.
It took about a week on and off to setup and I just did the two laptops in tandem. Windows 11.
The family thing can be a pain, Microsoft has a lot of half baked ideas https://www.tomsguide.com/computing/how-to-set-up-parental-controls-on-a-windows-11-pc
My parents and school administrators’ attempts at blocking unsanctioned activities is what taught me computer literacy
There was nothing quite as satisfying as getting caught opening addictinggames on a web browser through a proxy when the teacher was convinced they had blocked it completely.
My son’s group in middle school hosted their own proxy overseas. They then pirated a whole bunch of educational videos that the teachers liked to use and made nice clean interface. The games pages had no direct links on the educational videos screens. They had to type in the the page directly in the URL.
So the teachers all loved the site and gave the official “approved for all students” bypass on the districts Chromebooks. The kids had uninterrupted access to all their games.
The kids were smart enough to keep the location of the games to students with a B or higher GPA. Most of the teachers turned a blind eye to them playing games when they did get caught. The games pages also had a home button that sent the students screens to a random educational video. I was truly impressed with their clever approach.
The IT department either never caught on or enjoyed the games themselves because its still up and they are all in highschool now.
I remember when proxies were easy to find and you could get to the most ridiculous stuff. We had college intern system admins for IT at our HS so it was easier to get by alot of things most of the time.
A friend and I became unofficial TAs for a high school computers class when we defeated the remote-viewing software and any web blockers, we knew more than the poor teacher and it was easier to let us do what we wanted if we promised to help other kids do the actual lessons.
That network had terrible security. So many important files stored as unprotected text in the intranet.
Yeah, I found Microsoft family to be a pretty half-assed experience. The thing that seems to work best is the screen time management. I had planned to try and set up YouTube access via allow listing channels in a home Linux server, but it turns out that YouTube doesn’t identify their videos by channel in the URL and I’d have to allowlist every single video for a given channel.
I’m planning on building a server that rips channels videos and they can have the app for that.
We are a no YouTube without our explicit permission on the video kinda household. Too much actual brainrot. And as much as I don’t like Television, at least my kids are mentally protected from bullshit with the Children’s Television Protection Act.
You could theoretically host a Piped API instance, and use it to get channel info. I guess you are already using your own SSL certificates, judging by what you are trying to accomplish.
This is the Piped org btw: https://github.com/TeamPiped
It is a YouTube frontend/proxy.
Edit: I made a post on Piped’s community, so we can discuss it there: https://discuss.online/post/16448014
I’m not a sysadmin, I’m a backend dev with enough network knowledge to be dangerous. I’ve set up exactly one super basic website, so I know some of this stuff, I just have to (and can and will) stumblefuck my way through it. This seems like a really great idea, I had no idea Piped could potentially handle that. I’m going to keep an eye on this, thanks!
That’s awesome. I would’ve hated dealing with this as a kid. Will definitely steal this when I have kids.
same, except i would love to bypass this as an adult
Yea, my job at work now is to do this but all day lol. I build my network/firewall/and shit and then go around trying to break as much shit as I can so I can fix it.