We spend a good deal of time filtering and protecting clients from dangerous or inappropriate content. Every client has unique challenges and objectives of what the goals should be. Another part of what we do is filtering adult content from children in schools.
Over the past few years Google, Yahoo, and Bing have switched to a secure search model. This change has adverse effects on students in schools as it prevents people from forcing the Safe Search flag on student browsers. It makes it very challenging for IT Administrators to filter the results for students by default. Most firewalls cannot help with this either. It is a constant battle.
We are well down the road of having technology integrated into all parts of our kids lives. Search is a very basic thing and integrated into most devices the use. My Fourth grader can grab an iPad and search for anything.
One thing we cannot forget during this integration process is to protect our kids and families. Most parents do not have the ability or access to tools like I do. Search providers should be doing more to allow firewall, router, and other device providers the ability to block this content. I am not advocating for censorship of information. I am however saying let's give parents an easy clear cut choice to block the inappropriate stuff. Just give people a choice that is easy and clearly defined.