Michele Pierantozzi

LS 521 SP 02

4/1/02

Filtering

Filtering – The Pros and Cons

PROS

· The use of Internet filters along with parental and teacher supervision help to reduce children’s access to inappropriate information.

· Some pornography sites use words to attract kids to their sites such as teen, kitty, or toys. Filters help to block illegal pornography sites despite these traps.

· Although some appropriate sites are blocked, filtering software is improving.

· Many types of Internet filters include features to unblock appropriate sites.

· Filters help to support parental supervision and protect children from pornography and online predators.

· Many of the filtering programs for home and school allow parents and teachers to customize the filters to meet their needs.

CONS

• Filtering of the Internet does not take the place of parental supervision. Some filters do not block all inappropriate information.

• Filtering does not teach children to select appropriate information on the Internet or to use the Internet properly.

• Many filtering programs do not review the content of a site; the program simply scans for the inappropriate keywords in the site.

• No filtering software blocks all the inappropriate information on the Internet or allows access to all the appropriate information.

• Most filtering software does not provide a list of blocked sites. The user can only discover what is blocked by trial and error.

• Filtering software often blocks useful, legal material because of keywords found within the material.