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The world wide web is a still evolving community, home to everything from exotic recipes to ridiculous videos to books that are no longer in print. In recent years, as the Web 2.0 revolution shifted the focus of the content online from larger websites to individual users, the amount and variety of data and entertainment available has exploded. Unfortunately, while the nature of the internet allows the mass dissemination of pretty much anything, it also means that a significant percentage of what’s available might not be considered appropriate for minors (or in some cases, anyone).

Protecting kids from the hazards of dangerous and inappropriate material online has been a huge challenge for families and schools since the internet became a part of daily life for the majority of Americans. Some may feel in their frustration that the easiest solution is to simply keep kids off the internet entirely, but research has shown that keeping kids offline can stunt their development in the information age.

The internet is a priceless resource for the near instantaneous transfer of information, and being able to navigate it effectively is an indispensable skill in the modern world. Students can benefit greatly from the educational material online as well, so it’s understood that some sort of compromise must be made to allow children some access to the internet. Web filters are the most common tools that familys and schools utilize to try to allow children online without giving them access to everything on the web.

The balance that any web filter must create between allowing some but not all content in is a difficult one, and many services are criticized for either blocking legitimate content or allowing objectionable content through. Some filters even suffer from both of these problems simultaneously. Even worse, a percentage of filters can easily be subverted by inquisitive teens with little to no technical knowledge required.

Google, being the most popular and well known search engine on the planet, is the first stop for many web users and especially most of the younger users. There’s lots of safe content out there for children to access, and Google has always offered its own filter for search results, which has been very successful. Unfortunately these settings could easily be changed by any user, including the ones who shouldn’t not be getting unfiltered content in the first place.

Now, Google has launched an improvement that allows users to lock the SafeSearch option with a password to prevent kids from changing the settings. The results generated by Google’s search engine while these SafeSearch settings are in place will also be visibly different from the normal search results, with a large image of colored balls in the upper right corner letting parents and teachers know even from across the room that the filter is still working.

There’s more than one way to keep children safe online, and the best option is to combine several layers of protection. Google’s new SafeSearch is a valuable tool to help keep objectionable material away from children, but it’s no substitute for active involvement with children while they are using the internet and educating them about the dangers that lurk in the unsavory parts of the web.

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