Greetings All,
I have a problem that I have been working on for almost a year with level 2 Verizon tech support and have just learned that they can do nothing to help. Guess I was expecting that, I have not yet found a parental control or restriction App for phone or computer with any carrier or platform that works with my kid.
Verizon IT says that the issue is with the manufacturer of my kids electronic devices (IE Google Android Development in this case), and not with the Verizon Smart Family product that allows the parent to create settings such as how many hours and what hours the kid can be on their phone, access to gaming and porn, phone location alerts, sleep times, and if wifi is accessible or not and if so when.
Great App! IF IT WORKED, especially when the kid is addicted to gaming, and to their phone in general, and does not have the ability for self regulation (see nature of electronic addiction https://www.psycom.net/iadcriteria.html), nor much hope of learning it until their prefrontal cortex finishes developing (see the addicted brain https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/how-addiction-hijacks-the-brain).
I need to find a way to limit my kids phone use for gaming, watching videos, and general time spent on it for things that do not involve making or receiving phone calls - especially during school hours and sleeping hours.
I need a way to restrict WiFi use, and very few of the parental restriction and control apps do this.
During this last round of my kid vs. top IT staff, my kid won because he simply changed the VPN the phone was using, and since Verizon Smart Family runs of a specific VPN, Smart Family no longer functioned. Changing the VPN is not one of the blockable settings that can be password protected on an Android Phone. Did you know? Verizon didn't. They do now.
My kid can get around any (so far) Android smart phone family protection app in this way. And since Android phones do not have a way (that we have been able to find) to block my kid from changing the VPN, no parental restrictions work. At all. Grrrr! Maybe my kid will get a job in cyber security or be an app engineer when grown, if I can get them to pass high school with good enough grades to get into university and if they can stay focused long enough to get thru that too. I keep waiting for engineering to be smarter than the kids using their products - and to keep evolving fast enough to stay ahead of the challenge some users see in such products.
Development of a product that includes restrictions that can be set by the user should said user become mature and aware enough to realize they have a problem and want help self regulating.
I should think that there would be a good market for this in today's world.
Apple products on Verizon do not restrict wifi with the parent being able to change settings as needed without the battle for the physical device itself.
Apps for Android are mixed but the VPN change gets around all of them so far.
Anyone have a solution?
Have Android development engineers considered this problem and come up with a solution for us parents and those people who need some help self regulating their addictions?
If Google is looking for a kid vs IT Engineering Staff test subject on parental control apps, we are happy to volunteer. There must be many parents feeling the way I do, where my kid is a teenager and too old for physical confrontation, but too young to self regulate. Gee, even I know a few dozen adults who would be happy for such a product to help them regulate their phone-in-the-face time or help with self regulating their use of specific types of phone activities.
Thanks in advance for any constructive help that is offered,
--- irritated parent
I have a problem that I have been working on for almost a year with level 2 Verizon tech support and have just learned that they can do nothing to help. Guess I was expecting that, I have not yet found a parental control or restriction App for phone or computer with any carrier or platform that works with my kid.
Verizon IT says that the issue is with the manufacturer of my kids electronic devices (IE Google Android Development in this case), and not with the Verizon Smart Family product that allows the parent to create settings such as how many hours and what hours the kid can be on their phone, access to gaming and porn, phone location alerts, sleep times, and if wifi is accessible or not and if so when.
Great App! IF IT WORKED, especially when the kid is addicted to gaming, and to their phone in general, and does not have the ability for self regulation (see nature of electronic addiction https://www.psycom.net/iadcriteria.html), nor much hope of learning it until their prefrontal cortex finishes developing (see the addicted brain https://www.health.harvard.edu/newsletter_article/how-addiction-hijacks-the-brain).
I need to find a way to limit my kids phone use for gaming, watching videos, and general time spent on it for things that do not involve making or receiving phone calls - especially during school hours and sleeping hours.
I need a way to restrict WiFi use, and very few of the parental restriction and control apps do this.
During this last round of my kid vs. top IT staff, my kid won because he simply changed the VPN the phone was using, and since Verizon Smart Family runs of a specific VPN, Smart Family no longer functioned. Changing the VPN is not one of the blockable settings that can be password protected on an Android Phone. Did you know? Verizon didn't. They do now.
My kid can get around any (so far) Android smart phone family protection app in this way. And since Android phones do not have a way (that we have been able to find) to block my kid from changing the VPN, no parental restrictions work. At all. Grrrr! Maybe my kid will get a job in cyber security or be an app engineer when grown, if I can get them to pass high school with good enough grades to get into university and if they can stay focused long enough to get thru that too. I keep waiting for engineering to be smarter than the kids using their products - and to keep evolving fast enough to stay ahead of the challenge some users see in such products.
Development of a product that includes restrictions that can be set by the user should said user become mature and aware enough to realize they have a problem and want help self regulating.
I should think that there would be a good market for this in today's world.
Apple products on Verizon do not restrict wifi with the parent being able to change settings as needed without the battle for the physical device itself.
Apps for Android are mixed but the VPN change gets around all of them so far.
Anyone have a solution?
Have Android development engineers considered this problem and come up with a solution for us parents and those people who need some help self regulating their addictions?
If Google is looking for a kid vs IT Engineering Staff test subject on parental control apps, we are happy to volunteer. There must be many parents feeling the way I do, where my kid is a teenager and too old for physical confrontation, but too young to self regulate. Gee, even I know a few dozen adults who would be happy for such a product to help them regulate their phone-in-the-face time or help with self regulating their use of specific types of phone activities.
Thanks in advance for any constructive help that is offered,
--- irritated parent
