Kaspersky Parental Software Review

The Good: There is an awful lot of good here. First off, the parental controls come with Kaspersky’s internet security software meaning you get quality parental control along with top-notch virus protection. Kaspersky does all that it can to prevent your kids from getting to harmful websites, and in this regard I found it to be a little more accurate than Net Nanny at filtering out objectionable sites. Kaspersky also does a great job of logging web activity so you know exactly where your kids have been online. Both Kaspersky’s and Net Nanny’s logging are independent from your browser so even if your kids use some kind of “hidden” browsing mode or erase their browsing history, your parental software will still have those otherwise lost records. Kaspersky has different security levels and supports multiple user profiles. I could not find a way to disable Kaspersky without a password, even using Windows task manager. The price is also very right with Kaspersky’s software since it comes bundled with antivirus and at its lowest cost can be used on up to three computers so you no longer need to worry about triple the cost for one product (or in Kaspersky’s case, two products.)

The Bad: There is an awful lot of bad here, too. When your kids try to access an objectionable site Kaspersky pops up a big red box that looks exactly like the one that pops up for viruses and it often says something about being blocked for pornographic content. I have several problems with that. First, I don’t like a design that tells my kids, “you are bad!” every time Kaspersky deems something objectionable. Second, I don’t want Kaspersky reminding my kids that there is pornography all over the internet every day. Third, I don’t want my kids so desensitized to Kaspersky’s warnings that they never notice that the last site they went to contained a virus. I really want my kids aware if they have gone somewhere that could destroy their computer. Kaspersky does not have a language filter or search filter like Net Nanny so its method is, “block now – ask questions later.” Because of this Kaspersky will block entire pages of a google search or completely block an acceptable youtube video because there are unacceptable comments attached. During my tests I went to wow.com to read the latest World of Warcraft news. I clicked on a link to an article and Kaspersky blocked it for pornographic material (which does not exist on wow.com.) So I clicked my browser’s back button to go back to the main page and it, too, was now blocked for pornographic material. What this means to you is that if you use Kaspersky you may spend a lot of time unblocking things for your kids. I should mention, though, that I did not play around much with the lower levels of security, keeping it on “child” throughout my testing. Finally, Kaspersky does not attempt to block newsgroups or torrent downloads. I was able to get right by Kaspersky’s filters to inappropriate torrent searches and download whatever I could find onto my computer, and Kaspersky does not log what I download.

My final analysis on Kaspersky is that if it were a stand-alone parental software I’d probably advise you to pass. However, if you are more into preventing your kids from gaining access to objectionable material via their web-browser and you don’t care about all the innocent websites being blocked, this may be right up your alley. Considering the facts that Kaspersky’s parental control is a new feature, works well for what it’s intended to do, and is combined with a fantastic antivirus software, I feel great about recommending this software to anyone looking for an all-in-one product. Click the affiliate link below to buy now!