Living in our world with the realities of technology and the internet is complicated at best, especially for young families. As parents, it is our responsibility to equip our family with the skills to manage life and to filter out what is too much for our families’ current abilities. One of the big ways we can do that is by managing the quality and quantity of the media they consume regularly. Mobicip Parent Control and Internet Filter from Mobicip offers families a collection of tools to do this.

Mobicip Parent Control and Internet Filter is a parental control software that enables parents to limit screen time, manage app use, and track locations. We received a one-year license that protects up to 5 devices from one parent or administrator account. The 5 device account costs $3.99 per month, but they also offer coverage for up to 10 devices for $7.50 and 20 devices for $12.99 a month. In addition to monitoring 5 devices, the program allows you to set up profiles for each family member. In the profile setup process, it asks the age of the designated person and then recommends a general setting for that age, though everything is customizable. For my 7-year-old and 9-year-old children, it recommended a strict age setting out of the strict, moderate, and mature options available. If there are shared devices, the profile can easily be changed without having to edit a list of settings.

Once a license has been purchased, this software is accessible by downloading an app and is compatible with iOS, Android, Windows, Mac OS, Kindle, and Chromebook. Within each profile, there are settings for screen time, social apps, videos, mobile apps, web categories (block categories of sites), websites (block specific sites), phrases (block searches or topics), and networks.  Within these settings, the parent/administrator can see what each profile accesses, how much time is spent, and can even call for family time by blocking every device’s access at the same time.  This is a great tool especially if you have teenagers with devices in your home! The app and website are very user-friendly making everything easy to find and adjust when needed.

Depending on the age of a family’s children, this software may be valuable in different ways. For my family, the children’s screen time and content are already heavily controlled, but being able to put it on our phones allowed my husband and me the opportunity to see how we spend our time.  This is always a convicting and growing experience. For some, simply blocking content is the priority. When children become more social with their media, being notified of certain people or conversation topics may become the major concerns. As teenagers become mobile, knowing where they are and how they are spending their time on their devices is the ultimate tool for their safety. If the children of the family are very small, this program might not seem necessary on their account. However, we know that having unregulated access to the miracles and dangers of the internet is not healthy for any of us. Setting up a program like this before you think it is necessary could be a wonderful safety guard.

Mobicip is easy to use and provides modern families with all the tools they need to provide age-appropriate levels of media and interaction on their devices. As we live in this technology-saturated world, it is imperative that we proactively face and fight the evil under the surface and teach our families to do the same. Mobicip Parent Control and Internet Filter offers parents the power to do that.

Product review by Amy Butler, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, October 2020