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Managing User Accounts (Parental Controls)
Parental controls are special restrictions that allow administrators to control the activities of individuals on a computer. There are a couple of ways that one might want to restrict users on a computer: deny access to a specific application or system related task altogether, or restrict certain types of activities within an application.
Mac OS X:
All user restrictions for OS X are found under the 'Parental Controls' tab in System Preferences > Accounts. You can configure restrictions for the system, the Finder, Safari (web browsing), Mail (e-mail), and iChat (instant messaging). OS X additionally allows parental controls to be set for its built-in Dictionary.
OS X's Parental Controls
Finder & System:
Some of the parental controls you can configure are:
- Prevent the user from opening System Preferences
- Prevent them from modifying the icons in their dock
- Prevent users from administering printers
- Prevent the user from burning CD's and DVD's
- Prevent the user from opening Software Update
You can also control what applications a user is able/unable to open and run under their account. Simply click the check box next to the applications you want a user to have access to. The user will be denied access to any unchecked applications.
Safari:
With parental controls enabled for Safari, you can control which websites a specific user is able to browse on the Internet. Only websites approved by you will be allowed. These websites are defined in a "safe list" and will appear in the user's Safari bookmarks bar.
Any attempts to visit a website not approved by you and on the bookmarks bar will result in an error message. The user will be given the option to ask for permission to visit a website outside their "safe list".
Parental controls in OS X's Safari
Note: These settings only apply to Apple's Safari Internet browser. Any third party web browsers installed on the system are unaffected. You will have to disable access to these applications under the "Finder & System" parental controls if you want to enforce these restrictions.
Mail:
With parental controls enabled for Mail, you can control who a user is able to exchange e-mail with. You do this by creating a "safe list" of e-mail addresses that you have approved.
Parental controls in OS X's Mail
Any incoming e-mail received from an address NOT on a user's "safe list" will be routed to an e-mail address of your choice for approval. Once approved, the orginal user will receive the e-mail message. Otherwise, the message won't be delivered to the user's e-mail inbox.
This works for outbound e-mails as well. When a user tries to send an e-mail message to an unapproved address, they will receive an error message. The user will be given the option to ask permission to e-mail someone outside their "safe list".
Note: These settings only apply to Apple's Mail application. Any third party e-mail clients installed on the system are unaffected. You will have to disable access to these applications under the "Finder & System" parental controls if you want to enforce these restrictions.
iChat:
With parental controls turned on for iChat, you can control who a user is able to chat with online. iChat uses the same "safe list" method that both Safari and Mail's parental controls use. You can create a "safe list" of buddies a user is allowed to chat with. They won't be allowed to chat with anyone outside their "safe list".
iChat will hide/display a user's online status based on who is on their safe list. Only approved buddies that appear on their "safe list" will be notified when that user is online. They will be invisible to everyone else.
Note: These settings only apply to Apple's iChat client. Any third party instant messaging clients installed on the system are unaffected. u will have to disable access to these applications under the "Finder & System" parental controls if you want to enforce these restrictions.
Dictionary:
OS X's dictionary can be censored to hide curse words and other adult terms. Apply parental controls to Dictionary and you get to decide when your child learns the meaning of the F word.
Windows XP:
Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Messenger, and MSN Messenger lack parental controls. Yes, it's true that Internet Explorer allows you to place different websites into security zones such as "Trusted Sites" or "Restricted Sites", but these aren't parental controls. They are rather a method of assigning trusted sites to deliver active content to your web browser. The trusted Sites model is an operating system security model (to limit malware infections) not a parental controls model. Sites that aren't on the trusted sites list will prompt users before installing active content.
XP's Trusted and restricted sites must be administered within the user's account directly (a parent can't administer children's accounts from within a centralized console), and a parent would have no way to restrict access to all sites except the ones on the approved list. Some parents might find Safari's method of restricting access to all web sites except the ones on the approved list to be too restrictive, however it is the only way to be 100% certain of what a child is and is not seeing on the web.
Between the two operating systems, only OS X offers true parental controls to help parents or administrators restrict the abilities of the users on their computers.
OS X:
- Restrict which applications a user can run
- Restrict access to System Preferences and Software Update
- Administrators can configure parental controls for all users without having to switch users
- Can configure which websites a user can browse in Safari
- Can configure what e-mail addresses a user can exchange messages with in Mail
- Can configure which buddies a user can chat online with in iChat
- Parental controls only work within Apple's applications. Users can bypass OS X's parental controls by using third party software.
XP:
- Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Messenger, and MSN Messenger lack parental controls in XP
Mac OS X: 8
Windows XP: 0