Not Even Close to Childproof

This product is almost completely useless. My 12 year old child figured out how to remove the browser extension in 15 minutes. And yes, I know, the program automatically emails me to let me know that this happened. So, he gets to spend as much time as it takes me to notice the email - which, when this happened, was about an hour since I was out in the garden. This is not going to work for my family. At all.

I am extremely disappointed by this and will be reevaluating my use of other Norton products.

Hi @YuriyS,

    Can you kindly share details regarding your child's Android device (OS version, app version & manufacturer)? Can you verify if all the following required permissions are enabled (I have shared the path to the Settings that is more common among Android devices, you can search for the name of the setting if the path is not applicable for your device) and also verify if you received any tamper e-mails mentioning the same? 

  • Settings->Accessibility->Norton Family Accessibility service
  • Settings->Security->Device Administrators->Norton Family

Regards,
Padmanabhan
Norton Family Team

I must have interpreted your original statement incorrectly as you stated he could spend as much time as it took for you to get the email. Now I know what you are saying.

First a couple of clarifications, removing the extension is something we cannot prevent, it does not stop the browser from blocking inappropriate content. The extension allows us to be more precise and know which actual URLs your child is going to. So if a page has many URLs on it, with the extension we can determine which ones he navigated to directly vs. the URLs on the page. Second it allows us to have more details when accessing video.

As for any browser, since you are talking about PC protection, we are viewing at the network level, so although we warn about microsoft edge (they don't allow our plugin), we still appropriately block content based on the categories you have set up.

We are aware of some of the situations where children have devised solutions to get around our system and are continually evaluating solutions to help parents be more aware and to set up the proper guardrails for our kids.

Matt,

With all due respect, you are kidding right? You don’t understand the problem? You are advertising that parents can use your product to block access to websites that they consider inappropriate for their children. My 12 year old son figured out how to circumvent your program in less than 15 minutes by uninstalling the extension. Then he realized that he can just launch Microsoft Edge to access any site he wants. He is not a particularly tech savvy kid either.

This has nothing to do with the time limits. He should be able to be on the computer without me being physically in the room and without him being able to access inappropriate websites. That’s what “blocking” means. Your solution is to send me an email message when he does uninstall your extension, or run Edge, but A) that means I have to have email access and be checking it, b) he still has access for the amount of time it takes me to get back to the room where he is working and ask him to stop, and C) this is not what you advertised.

This really is deceptive. You are selling a false sense of security to parents. To be honest I don’t really care about my $50. I care about the fact that you are misleading parents who may not be as tech savvy as I am and may not realized that your product is not actually blocking access to inappropriate sites.

Norton Family is designed to help keeping children safe. However as you and others have pointed out there are some children that are more technically savvy that will figure a way around any product not just Norton Family. We do everything we can to prevent our product from being removed or tampered with. If you are not happy with how the product performs and would like a refund by all means contact our support team.

I would like to understand your issue further. Removing the browser extension would not stop the time limits from working so I don't think i understand your original complaint.

Matt Boucher
VP of Engineering
Cloud Services / Norton Family

Symantec Corporation
www.symantec.com

This comment is incredibly patronizing. I have already had “a word” with my child about this issue. Our decision to use your product was supposed to help address the fact that our conversations with him have not been enough to stop his behavior.

My concern here is not so much about the $50 I wasted on your product. It is not even really about my own child. What really makes me angry about all of this is that you are selling a product that simply does not work as it is advertised, and that many parents who are not very tech savvy do not have the ability to understand this.

I believe that you are putting the health and safety of children at risk with your false advertising.

I plan to file a complaint with the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. I encourage everyone reading this thread to do the same.

https://www.ftc.gov/about-ftc/bureaus-offices/bureau-consumer-protection

Hi Gabriel,

Thank you for the feedback!

Browser extension is a prerequisite for the product to function completely and should not be removed or disabled. User has privileges on the extensions in their computer and cannot be controlled entirely. In the event the extension is removed or disabled by the child, please enable it again and have a word with your child to ensure the child browsing remains safe.

We in Norton Family team have been exploring various options to protect the child even when the extension is unavailable. We have made substantial progress on a solution which would soon be released to Windows PC. Thanks for your patience.

Regards,

Norton Family Team

I am also tired of struggling to prevent my 10-year child from deleting the Norton Family from his Android device. As far as I understood, there is no way to do so.