Keeping children safe on the Internet is very important. With cell phones and tabs finding their way to even the tiniest of people, it’s essential that we talk about different methods of parental control. These help parents block or monitor adult and other inappropriate content from reaching children, who are still too young to know all that.
But most blocking methods generally cannot block site-specific content. For example, YouTube — the most popular video site — also has content that isn’t right for everyone. Blocking it makes absolutely no sense as it means missing out on important and interesting stuff.
So how do you make sure your kids stay safe while browsing YouTube? The answer to it comes in many forms, however, the one that really hits the spot is built-in YouTube Restricted Mode.
Restricted Mode, formerly known as YouTube’s Safe Mode, isn’t a perfect method, but it’s a good way to filter content off YouTube that you don’t want your kids to see.
Note: Restricted mode works at the browser/device level, so you must enable it for each browser you use. The same can happen for browser-level configurations – it needs to be enabled ABOVE
How to Block Youtube Channels With Restricted Mode
Enabling Restricted Mode/Safe Mode on YouTube is easy. All you have to do is log into your YouTube account and click account information icon in the right corner.
Scroll below and click Restricted Mode and toggle the switch to On. As mentioned above, this mode is not 100% accurate and it filters videos based on content that others have flagged down.
click ABOVE will reload the YouTube homepage with Safe mode turned on.
Here’s what YouTube’s Safe Mode does:
- Hide inappropriate videos
- No results are returned for adult search terms
- Hide comments by default
- Inappropriate words in comments are hidden by asterisks
So, if you’re a parent whose kids are online most of the day and spend a lot of time on YouTube, you might consider enabling this option for a controlled browsing experience for them.
However, if you’re not sure if YouTube’s built-in feature is the ideal safety net for your child, here are some other ways to block YouTube videos.
1. How to Block a Specific YouTube Channel Naturally
If you follow tech news, you’ve probably come across many YouTube channels that have been taken down for inappropriate content. If you feel that your child should not encounter a particular channel, you can adjust the settings slightly to block these channels completely.
Go About channel’s page and click Flag icon below statistics.
Select block users and click Submit. From now on, videos from that particular YouTube channel will not appear in your feed.
If you’re using the YouTube app for Android or iOS, you can do the same.
Go to the channel’s homepage and tap the three-dot menu in the upper right corner. Select block users from the menu and you’re done.
2. How to block a YouTube channel with a Google Chrome extension
Lemonrice’s Video Blocker is a cool Google Chrome extension that, as the name suggests, blocks YouTube videos in a super easy way.
All you need to do is right click on the video title and select Block videos from this channel. That’s it. It will not ask for a second confirmation and the channel will be blocked immediately.
This nifty Chrome extension for YouTube also has other cool features like keyword filtering and json file export that you can explore.
3. How to block videos on YouTube Kids
However, if you don’t trust the extensions or root methods above, you can get the YouTube Kids app from the Google Play Store. It has many whimsical and funny videos, along with a few educational and musical videos, depending on the age of the child.
Furthermore, the video search option can also be turned off if you want your kids to stick to the YouTube kids home page.
However, not all is fun and interesting in this children’s world and chances are some inappropriate videos still reach them. At the end of the day, it’s a combination of human review and algorithmic filtering.
Either way, if you want your kids to stick with the fun part of YouTube Kids, thankfully the app lets you block specific videos or channels.
Tap the three-dot icon next to any video you think is inappropriate and select Block Video.
To block any unwanted channels, tap the channel and once you enter it, tap the three-dot menu at the top. Select channel blocking and that’s it.
Good tip
In addition, video recommendations can also be paused so you are sure that no unwanted videos are shortlisted for suggestions.
For this, go to Setting and tap the child’s profile. Then turn on the switch for pause history.
Note
All safe?
So now you know how to block YouTube channels and videos. However, not all filters are 100% safe and the same applies to these filters.
So while the software algorithms do their job, always keep an eye on your little one while they are on your mobile phone or tablet. At the end of the day, few can beat the human element.
Categories: How to
Source: thpttranhungdao.edu.vn/en/
