Parental Control Over Mobile Phones
08 Sep, 2007, 4:26 pm IST |
Anjali Rego
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American wireless carrier AT&T Inc. will launch a service that promises to be a teen's worst nightmare: parental control of mobile phones on almost all of its 63.7 million subscriber lines. This means that there will be a limit when a wireless phone can receive and make phone calls and to whom, set allowances for ring tones and other downloads, and impose restrictions on text messages and talk time. This software comes as a blessing to parents who are dismayed at overuse of text or phones. In this way, parents can control their children’s usage without having to deprive them of the gadget. Many parents want their children to have a mobile phone for safety reasons, but do not want them to make or receive unnecessary calls during the school day, chatting away all the shared family-plan minutes or running up the phone bill with text messaging charges. AT&T's Smart Limits service will be offered as an add-on for 4.99 US $ a month per line. No contract will be required, and it will work on all but a handful of customer lines left on an old network the company is phasing out. The functions include call blocking and hour limits to text message. Download allowances will have to be set through the website. Calls to or from a parent's number and to 911 can be made anytime without any restrictions. The AT&T service also allows filtering of websites parents don't want their children accessing from their phones, but that function will not work on the Apple iPhone because the browser is different. The website filter will also be inoperable when a phone is using a Wi-Fi network because AT&T can only block content delivered over its wireless networks. |
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