Parental Control Review 2017 – Kaspersky Safe Kids Premium
Parental Control Review 2017 for Windows
| Release date | 2017-08-15 |
| Revision date | 2017-07-24 |
| Test Period | July 2017 |
| Number of Testcases | 2000 |
| Online with cloud connectivity |  |
| Update allowed | |
| False Alarm Test included | |
| Platform/OS | Microsoft Windows |
Introduction
Amongst other things, parental control software allows parents to filter out websites that their children can see, in order to avoid the children being exposed to materials the parents consider unsuitable, such as pornography, gambling or weapons.
Parental Control Certification
AV-Comparatives provides certification for parental control software. In order to be certified, a product must block at least 98% of pornographic websites, have no more than a few false alarms on child-friendly websites, and have no severe unresolved bugs(or design flaws) discovered during the review. A certification is valid for one year and vendors can apply for certification once a year.
Tested Products
Test Procedure
We tested the effectiveness of the parental control software against 2,000 websites with potentially inappropriate content for children. We chose the appropriate settings for a 9-year-old girl, which would block sites relating to pornography, gambling and weapons.
Review
We have included a short review of the product in this report, so that parents have an idea of what the product is like to use and what other features it has. Please note that certification is not affected by any of the points mentioned in the review, and is based solely on the technical test results described above.
Testcases
The 2000 URLs were broken down as follows:
- Pornography: 1,600 sites displaying pornographic images and text
- Gambling: 200 sites which allow online betting
- Weapons: 200 sites selling or advertising weapons online
We additionally tested 100 obviously child-friendly websites, such as lego.com, to check for false positives.
Test Results
| Block Rate | |
| Adult | 98.1% |
| Gambling | 98% |
| Weapons | 97% |
| False-Positives | 0 |
Product Reviews
Kaspersky Safe Kids Premium for Windows
About the product
Kaspersky Safe Kids is a parental control product for Windows PCs, Mac, Android and iOS devices. There is a single web interface for all platforms, so you can manage PCs, tablets and mobile phones in the same place. The Windows version applies restrictions on the basis of Windows user accounts; this means that if you and your children log on to a family computer with different names, you can apply restrictions to them but not yourself.
Version tested
1.0.2.349 (a)
Which versions of Windows does it work with?
Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, 10
What parental control features does it have?
Safe Kids Premium includes child’s device location monitoring, call and text-message monitoring, Internet monitoring and blocking of inappropriate material, time limits, application control, and social network monitoring.
What categories of material does it block?
The categories that can be filtered, and their default settings, are shown below:
Installing and configuring the product
Installing the product on a Windows PC involves downloading and running the installer file and clicking Install. The configuration wizard then asks you whether the PC is used by parents, children or both; in the latter case, it will remind you that children need to log on with their own user names (user accounts) before using the computer:
Blacklisting/whitelisting individual sites
The Exclusions section of the Internet settings page lets parents specify individual sites in a blocked category to be allowed, or vice versa:
Time limits
You can monitor the time your child spends using the computer, or set time limits to restrict access. Time limits can be a total number of hours per day, whereby each day of the week can be configured individually, or a precise access schedule can be set, as shown below:
What does the child see when a page is blocked?
Help
Clicking the ? symbol in the program window opens the program’s online help pages:
Verdict
Kaspersky Safe Kids for Windows is a very comprehensive package with a wide range of features. We found the web interface to be very clearly laid out and easy to use, whilst providing a very good range of functions.
Award levels reached in this Parental Control Review
Kaspersky Safe Kids Premium for Windows reached the above requirements and therefore receives the 2017 AV-Comparatives Approved Parental Control Award.
| Kaspersky | APPROVED |
Copyright and Disclaimer
This publication is Copyright © 2017 by AV-Comparatives ®. Any use of the results, etc. in whole or in part, is ONLY permitted after the explicit written agreement of the management board of AV-Comparatives prior to any publication. AV-Comparatives and its testers cannot be held liable for any damage or loss, which might occur as result of, or in connection with, the use of the information provided in this paper. We take every possible care to ensure the correctness of the basic data, but a liability for the correctness of the test results cannot be taken by any representative of AV-Comparatives. We do not give any guarantee of the correctness, completeness, or suitability for a specific purpose of any of the information/content provided at any given time. No one else involved in creating, producing or delivering test results shall be liable for any indirect, special or consequential damage, or loss of profits, arising out of, or related to, the use or inability to use, the services provided by the website, test documents or any related data.
For more information about AV-Comparatives and the testing methodologies, please visit our website.
AV-Comparatives
(August 2017)