iPhone News Updated

Helping Parents Snoop on Kids’ iPhone Habits

The debate over supplying children with Apple iPhones might be heating up, but perhaps a more pressing concern is the level of access that kids already equipped with smartphones have to the rowdy world of the Web.

Mobicip, a start-up based in southern California, is one of the companies trying to tackle that issue head on. The company provides a free, kid-safe browser for iPhones and iPod Touches. Mobicip’s browser works exactly like Safari, but bars access to Web sites containing sexually explicit material, graphic violence, Web-based chat clients, e-commerce, social networks and games.

But simply monitoring for domain names isn’t enough to keep curious eyes away from illicit content, said Suren Ramasubbu, founder and chief executive of Mobicip.

“Kids are so savvy these days, it’s really easy to get around domain-based filters,” said Mr. Ramasubbu.

To that end, Mobicip employs a custom-built algorithm that screens phrases and metadata embedded in Web pages to determine if content is appropriate for young Web surfers.

Parents also have the option of adjusting the level of restriction by age group. Mr. Ramasubbu said the company planned to release a premium version of Mobicip for $9.99 that lets parents see which Web sites are being visited.

Another program, iWonder Surf, available for download for $14.99, performs a function similar to Mobicip, but the remote access is more fleshed out, allowing parents the ability to block and unblock sites at their leisure. With iWonder Surf, parents can see which Web sites are being visited, and in the case of some social networks, like MySpace, find out which profiles their children have viewed.

Safe Eyes Mobile, available for $19.99, is another application that controls access. Safe Eyes Mobile, like its desktop brother, tracks Web history and sends e-mail notifications to parents when Web surfers try to gain access to restricted Web sites. In addition, Safe Eyes Mobile lets parents set limits on browsing time.

Mr. Ramasubbu says applications like Mobicip and Safe Eyes Mobile are just the first step toward keeping kids from stumbling onto explicit sites.

“Parents have to keep an eye on the sites their kids are visiting and talk to them about their behavior,” he said.

So far, Mobicip is gaining some traction: the application has been downloaded 3,500 times since it was released in February. “We get a lot of fan mail from parents and a lot of hate mail from the kids,” said Mr. Ramasubbu.

[Thanks: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/]

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