Windows 8 forum: Keeping your family safer with Windows 8

Is it just me or does this creep anyone else out. I see a need for protecting our children from the dangers on the net but this seems to be just over the top. The other problem with this is that parents are going to see this as a catch all and not do their own do diligent in protecting their kids.

Please do a copy and paste to show where I say that I object to protecting children. I do not think you can. If not, please copy and paste the part that you read wrong that made you think I object to protecting children.

Protecting your children is the same as protecting anything else. You got to take an active role in it. Your children deserve more attention then anything else. A lot of people are going to look at this and think oh wow they will be safe because M$ is going to watch them for me. Surely you know better then that. Least I hope you do. Remember that security begins with us. Not some program that is going to be phoning home and then emailing us. I think by the time the parent gets the email it is to late.

Think about this. If this was truly setup to help the parent see what the children are doing, then just leave the data on the puter that only the parent can retrieve while using an administrator account. Why is the data being bounced around the internet and then emailed back to the parent. Do you see the problem now.

There is such a potential for abuse for this it is scary. I know that you think all companies are good and none have any bad intention but that is not how it works. It is a M$ program. Every Firewall made will give this access to the net. Now ask yourself where the data is being sent before being emailed to the parent. Ask yourself who else might be able to abuse this. I know M$ is drooling over the data that they will be able to collect on the next generation of puter users. Shoot, I bet the crackers and script kiddies are gearing up as we type to find away to take control of this for their advantage.

I got to tip my hat to the marketing of this. They tell you that they are including spyware in Win8 but not to worry because it is not spyware. It is a program to monitor your children puter usage to keep them safe. After sending the data all over the internet, even tho we could have left it on your hard drive that only you could access, we will send you an email that is neatly formatted to look very professional so you feel safe.

I think you're being overly optimistic about this program.

Only activities done in the parent-controlled account on his own devices are logged. What he does at school, holiday, friends, grandparents doesn't show up. All you need is a friend with an iPad and you can do what you want. Using the guest account on your own PC or the family PC also lets her work unmonitored.

A rather awkward situation arises if the child uses a friends monitored account. Imagine: "No, dad, I really didn't look porn. It must have been Michael when he was here Thursday. I remember leaving him at my PC when I went buying a bottle of Coke for us. I couldn't imagine he would do something like this. Really, dad."

And, assuming MSN chats with your friends are legitimate, there's no protection at all against the 40 year old pedophile pretending he's a boy wanting to see the more intimate body parts of your daughter.
Unless, of course, all details of all conversations are logged and sent to the parents, I don't think they would see they were chatting "to an adult posing as a child on the internet", as mentioned in one of your links.

Kees

You typed this. " And your objection to protecting children is... what? " That implies that you had read that I objected to protecting children online. I never typed anything that could have been remotely interpreted as that. I know you are having troubles with seeing people that have conspiracy theories and that has me troubled. What some people are doing and that includes me, is pointing out that there is to much corporate spyware being produced. For the life of me I can not understand why you have such a feel good attitude about peoples privacy being violated. Worst even is why you have such a feel good attitude about M$ coming up with a piece of spyware that is going to monitor what children are doing and collect it. Designed to lock them into M$ products to insure that they can continue tracking them. That creeps me out.

You ask me what evidence that I have that this is more than about child safety. The most simple answer to that is the neatly formatted, professional email that they will receive detailing what their child has been doing. I know you will not answer these question but I just have to ask you it anyway.

Why does the data have to leave the puter? Why are they sending it in an email? Why is it being bounced around the internet and then back to the parent? If this was not spyware and about child safety then they could just leave the data on the puter and let the parent access it with an administrative account.

Please answer why this data has to leave the puter.

I hope you can see the answer to all of this in just the questions I have asked. It is always good to ask questions. That is what keeps us safe. We have a saying and it applies to this program. If it sounds to good to be true, then most likely it isn't.

Lets address something else you typed. " You still think parents can do this on their own?
To me that is kind of a sad question and speak to how we view things differently. You see the world thru eyes that think that Corporations and Government are the way to help the children. I see the world thru eyes that think that parents need to step up and take a very active roll in what their children are doing. I have stated this in my past post. To many parents are going to see this and think that M$ is going to be protecting their kids when in affect all they are doing is building another data base on the future user of the internet. If they were not doing that then why is the data being bounced around the internet. The only reason that data is leaving the puter is for them to collect it.

This reminds of when they started convincing people that the pop up we got from our firewall was just to annoying for us to handle. That we should turn over control of our puters to them and their white list. Let me paste something from the original post. " In the past, many of the industry software solutions for family safety (including Microsoft's) focused on web filtering and other software-based restrictions. This resulted in a more complex setup experience and a constant stream of parental approval requests that could be difficult to manage. The end result was that many parents abandoned family safety products and returned to in-person supervision only—a tactic that has become less effective as computers have gotten more mobile. " Do you see what they are doing. It is the same marketing approach. It is just to annoying for you to do. Trust us and lets us monitor them for you. That whole thing is a cleverly crafted piece of marketing that say that you just need to turn it over to us and let us track their every move on the internet.

You state in your reply to Kees_B that M$ is trying to help the parents. You ask if he thinks they should not try. M$ is not trying to help the parent with Internet safety. They are hiding a piece of children spyware in a program designed to make them profits down the road. I find this the most despicable and shameful part about this whole thing. That is why I asked if this creeps anyone else out besides me.

There is a reward for turning this over to M$. Your going to get a very neat and professional looking email that is going to detail the data that they have collected on the child and get you a false since of security.

When my child has an Android tablet or a iPad or an iPod I can't see what he does. So I give him a Windows phone and Windows tablet.
When he uses Google to search the web, I don't think his top searches will be on the report. So I use the default Bing search in Internet Explorer.

Kees