iProtectYou Pro 8.8

Overview

iProtectYou is an Internet filtering, parental control and network monitoring software - three in one. As an Internet filter, it seems to be doing a great job, and it comes with a whole palette of rich features: logging, time management, reporting, blocking.

iProtectYou differentiates usernames in Windows and lets parents assign categories to names. The program offers several intensity filtering levels for particular groups, or individual users.

The keyword filtering is divided into typical categories: violence, drugs, sex, nudity, satanic, extremism, indecent. Those categories are blocked by default, but parents, or whoever is in control of managing the program, can choose to set specific configuration for individual users.

Installation

Once you click install, the wizard asks you to disable your antivirus, firewall and close all your open browsers. Clearly, to take control over your system the app needs to infiltrate all of its nooks and corners. We strongly suggest users read the extensive Help and FAQ section on the developer’s website before you proceed with the installation.

Interface

iProtectYou offers a neat and intuitive GUI. It shouldn't be a problem even for novice users to be able to configure the settings. You can create Internet schedule to set different access hours for users of your system, as well as create time limits per day.

It is possible to configure the app to display a warning message every time it blocks a website. There are several different themes you can choose for the warning messages.

The statistics and reports are extensive and comprehensive: visited websites, received warnings, applications launched. Moreover, it is possible to set traffic limits.

Configuration for time management options is also easy to configure. You can actually limit the number of bytes your children can download per day.

Features

iProtectYou offers filtering websites and newsgroups, restricting usage of Internet in time and download amount, restricting Internet access for specific applications, blocking emails and online chats and P2P connections that have inappropriate vocabulary. One of the most appreciated features is differentiating access and rights among different users, or groups of users. Detailed activity logs help parents monitor their children’s activity online. The built-in database of harmful websites is impressive.

The trial version has a 14 day limit. All features seem to be active during the evaluation period.

Pros

iProtectYou offers a powerful web filtering tool. You can filter emails, chat messages, P2P messages, newsgroups. A certain level of customization of warning messages make it easy for the parents to choose what kind of message their child will see when the program blocks a website. It can be a cartoon message, a ‘not found’ message, or a strict warning.

The user in control of this application will receive notifications of violations by email with screenshots attached. The report logs are extensive and comprehensive and contain the list of every opened program and visited website.

Cons

Sometimes, we felt like the program was overreacting. For example, it does not always understand the difference between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ content. As a result, the good stuff can be blocked along with the bad stuff.

If the iProtectYou blocks a piece of content in a program, it shuts down the entire program. In our case, it blocked the download of all emails, not just the ones with offensive verbiage.

The need to put an antivirus program on the list of trusted programs seems a little odd. An antivirus should be trusted by default.

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