My Mobile Watchdog protects young kids

Launched by Verb Innovations, it addresses the problem of the growing number of young children involved in practices of "sexting" and "cyber bullying", as well as the use of social media applications by sexual predators to make contact with children online. Parents currently control what their children can view on satellite television and the internet accessed via the home PC, however until now there has been no effective way to monitor the "mobile generation's" first choice of cyber communication.

Functions

It monitors incoming and outgoing, SMS, MMS, phone calls and emails. It enables parents to block applications (social networking sites) as well as block the web. Parents can choose to be notified via text message or email for all suspicious activities on their child's phone. In addition, its is able to co-ordinate a child's cellphone calendar allowing a parent to remotely notify them about changes in afternoon activities or pick-up arrangements (as an example).

Gareth Miller, director of Verb Innovations, said that parents purchase cellphones for their young children due to concerns over their safety in South Africa. Often the choice and brand of phone are a consequence of peer pressure, as cellphones have become the new status symbol among children. "Many cellphones in the hands of our children today have internet access without parental control, as well as the capability to run social media applications that give strangers access to our children via chat rooms etc."

Miller said that his initial idea was to develop software to combat the problems that many affected parents have experienced due to their children's innocent use of cellphones in South Africa. However, after months of research he decided to contact eAgency, as he believed this company was the market leader in parental control applications aimed at cellphones.

"The application has the benefit of being a dual implementation solution: it can be downloaded as an application on most smartphones or as a more wide-reaching network installation thereby providing many more parents the ability to protect their children," he concludes.

For more information about its launch in South Africa, email or go to www.mymobilewatchdog.co.za.