Windows Vista Parental Controls

Most of the info on this blog has been focused on the benefits of User Account Control for the enterprise and was written for IT professionals and developers. This post highlights one of the key benefits for home computer users, and in particular, for parents.

One of the limitations to providing really complete parental controls in the past was that all users of the computers were administrators and could probably undo most of the settings the parent tried to enforce. Windows Vista helps solve that problem by enabling people to use Windows without administrator privileges and adds a robust set of Parental Controls that parents can use to ensure their children are accessing appropriate programs and Web sites, when it is appropriate for them to be doing so.

To illustrate how the Family Safety Settings work and how they are integrated with User Account Control, I will use characters in a fictitious family where Abby is the parent and Toby is the child. Abby and Toby are personas that we’ve been using for years in developing Windows Vista and you will see these names often in screenshots on Microsoft.com and in demonstrations of Windows Vista.

Integral to the successful use of parental controls is the concept of User Account Control, and individual, non-administrator accounts for each user. Abby empowers Toby by giving him his own logon account, but with parameters that ensure she can confidently give him his independence within that account.

After creating an account for Toby, Abby enables Parental Controls on Toby’s account through the Control Panel. Abby can chose to limit what Web sites Toby can visit, what programs and games Toby can use, what time he can use the computer, and she can also access a report on all of his activities. Parental Controls in Windows Vista gives parents the option of taking a more active role in their children’s safe computer use, if they so choose, and can facilitate some healthy discussions about boundaries and how to stay safe online.

See larger screen shot.

To encourage a collaborative approach to child safe computing, limitations set through Parental Controls are not hidden in Windows Vista - if Toby tries to access a Web site that his mother did not give him permission to see, he will see the following screen in his Web browser informing him that the Web site is blocked.

See larger screen shot.

However, the screen also provides a link to “Ask an administrator for permission” to visit the site. If he clicks that link, he will be given the User Account Control over-the shoulder credentials prompt. This way if Abby feels like this is a site she wants Toby to visit, she has an easy way to grant permission.

After she provides her password, she is given one more dialog so she knows exactly what site she is giving Toby access to.

This example highlights the need to have strong passwords for all computer accounts. If Abby’s password was blank or easily guessed, Toby could easily circumvent the parental controls.

This also underscores the need for software that works well for non-administrator accounts. We anticipate that the Parental Controls will be a primary reason that many families want to get a computer with Windows Vista. However, since Parental Controls can only be enabled for non-administrator accounts, it is important that software developers create software—particularly educational tools, games, and other programs designed for children—that works well for standard users.

- Alex Heaton
User Account Control Product Manager

Comments

• Anonymous
  April 06, 2006
  The UAC Team has posted an indepth article on Windows Vista's Parental Controls. The Parental Controls...

• Anonymous
  April 06, 2006
  With the "Game Ratings" stuff, how does that work? Do games report their rating when they're installed or something?
  
  What about if a game doesn't report any rating, where does it sit?

• Anonymous
  April 08, 2006
  PingBack from http://techtasks.com/WindowsVista/blog/2006/04/windows-vista-parental-controls/

• Anonymous
  April 08, 2006
  Apart from showing of, why would professionals bother with these controls, when you can use group policy etc?
  
  Or can these settings all be customised by group policy?
  
  Why don't you call it: "Administrator Safety Settings" in the Business and Enterprise, and maybe Ultimate Versions.
  
  You can Keep the current name in the Home versions.
  
  Surely, this makes more sense!

• Anonymous
  April 09, 2006
  PingBack from http://www.vista-ultimate.net/parental-controls-in-windows-vista/

• Anonymous
  April 10, 2006
  Please ignore "Someone Special" and keep this in all consumer versions.
  
  If it helps to keep the codebase identical, then keep it in all.  It doesn't hurt anybody.

• Anonymous
  April 10, 2006
  I'm the Program Manager for the Parental Controls feature in Windows Vista. I want to answer a few of the questions brought up here.
  
  1. How does the games rating stuff work?
  
  A. The rating information is included in a file called the GDF (game definition file) that is part of the game.  However, just because a game supports our GDF format, it doesn’t mean it has been rated by the different ratings boards through out the world.  This is up to the publisher / developer to do and include in the GDF.  It is a very common scenario for a game to be rated by the ESRB (US rating system) but not some of the others.  This means the game will show up as unrated if such a rating system is selected.
  
  
  
  For games that don’t include a GDF (anything done before now) there are 2 possibilities – 1) We have a list of over 2000 tier 1 games that Windows Vista recognizes and pulls down the data much like Media Player grabs artist and album information, or 2) The game shows as unrated.  Parental Controls allows you to bulk block games that are unrated as well as selectively allow those you are comfortable with on a per-game basis.
  
  2. What SKU's will parental controls be in?
  
  A. Parental Controls will be available in all consumer SKU's, including Starter Edition and Ultimate. It will NOT be in any of the business SKU's nor server SKU's. While we recognize that some of the Parental Controls functionality could be desirable in a business environment, they have not been architected to work optimally in those environments. Parental Controls in Windows Vista is tailored to family usage in homes.
  
  -Brian Trenbeath
  Program Manager
  Windows Vista Parental Controls
  
   
  

• Anonymous
  April 10, 2006
  Cool

• Anonymous
  April 11, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  April 11, 2006
  Smart children will go download a copy of Firefox instead. :)

• Anonymous
  April 12, 2006
  Sony just announced new Vaio PC models ([1], [2]) complete with “Vista capable” stickers. There will shortly be many more from all the OEMs.
  Mary Jo Foley speculates on what the Vista delay will mean for the nominally biennial follow-ons

• Anonymous
  April 12, 2006
  Two suggestions...
  
  1) In the "Will you allow Toby to access this website?" dialog, it would be nice if there was a 3rd button saying to "Preview" the website or "Allow One Time" so a website can be seen once by the parent before really committing to always allowing it. Usually the web address is not enough to make a decision. I think MSN parental controls has this already.
  
  2) It would be nice if the Time Limits could work such that time limits could be placed on individual programs, or at least on web access. Probably better (more robust) if it could be for particular programs. For instance, I might want to let my child use Word, Excel, etc. as much as they want so they can do homework, but time limit how much they can use MSN Messenger, IE, or AIM or games.

• Anonymous
  April 12, 2006
  > Smart children will go download a copy of Firefox instead.
  
  No they won't, Parental Controls only work when the child is not an administrator. Even if you /could/ install Firefox as a non-admin, a parent would just block them from installing it or running it.
  
  It would be a bit pointless if you could do otherwise.

• Anonymous
  April 13, 2006
  Even if the person is using a browser other than Internet Explorer the Parental Controls will block non-approved URLs.

• Anonymous
  April 16, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  April 17, 2006
  I'd say the filter is probably built into the Windows firewall, which you CAN'T bypass, and you certainly won't be able to stop the firewall without being an administrator.

• Anonymous
  April 20, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  April 27, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/199/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls.html

• Anonymous
  May 08, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/261/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-2.html

• Anonymous
  June 16, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/492/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-3.html

• Anonymous
  June 16, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/493/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-4.html

• Anonymous
  July 01, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/579/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-5.html

• Anonymous
  July 05, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/603/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-6.html

• Anonymous
  July 11, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/637/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-7.html

• Anonymous
  July 22, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/698/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-8.html

• Anonymous
  September 04, 2006
  PingBack from http://parental-control-articles.com/blog/961/uacblog-windows-vista-parental-controls-9.html

• Anonymous
  October 14, 2006
  I welcome the inclusion of parental controls in Vista. This is something I have wanted to start using for my kids, but I haven't found a suitabel application out there yet. So I will be upgrading our PCs as soon as I can. I notice that using the parental controls I can set the times of day that each child can use the PC. Is it also possible to limit the total number of hours used per day or per week rather than restricting to certain times of day?

• Anonymous
  November 05, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  November 05, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  November 16, 2006
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  December 19, 2006
  I don't see what use the Time Limits are, since my daughter just changes them, even though she is just a standard user. What's the point of me setting them for her if she can just go in and change them? Sheesh.

• Anonymous
  February 08, 2007
  I dont have installed parental control. How do I do?

• Anonymous
  February 22, 2007
  I browsed through the help files on this and found something like..."On the start screen, scroll to Tasks, click settings, click General, and then click Parental Controls." Start screen? I didn't understand that because when I start Parental Controls(PC) in Vista the tasks are already listed in the left pane and don't even include "Settings". The help file continues to talk about being able to change an access code. Where is that??? It seems that Vista has erroneous help files and has tied everything to the user/admin accounts and their passwords. In my case, I need 2 admins. 1 that has access to everything and sets the password to PC. And 1 that can do everything EXCEPT change the PC settings or passwords.

• Anonymous
  February 28, 2007
  PingBack from http://www.brethorsting.com/uidesign/2007/02/meet_uac_-_why_you_must_factor_out_your_apps_admin_components.html

• Anonymous
  March 03, 2007
  Enforcing Parental Controls, with Off everywhere prevents web connect to one of Toby's applications.  Removing controls restores it.  Why, please?