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$69.95
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SpyAgent by Spytech has done a good job of improving their computer monitoring software this time around.
They offer some impressive tools in their parental control software arsenal, including quality website monitoring, very detailed reports, and an improved stealth mode.
As for remote monitoring in SpyAgent, Spytech doesn't make it perfectly clear that remote monitoring
is possible, but only if parents purchase a secondary program called, "SpyAnywhere Suite."
The extra cost could be avoided by going with another parental control software program like eBlaster or WebWatcher.
And there are other little issues: a lack of focus for social networking sites, overcomplicated reporting options, and only basic filtering tool.
All-in-all, this mean SpyAgent is heavy in the monitoring, and less so on the more pro-active filtering that saves many parents some much-needed time.
$69.95
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Website Monitoring
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Perhaps most important of all parental control tasks (even more so than website blocking) is website monitoring, and SpyAgent does quite a good job with website monitoring.
All of the websites visited on the PC in question are logged according to website address, username, and the time of the site visit.
What's more, is that SpyAgent supports pretty much every web browser imaginable, so even if your kids try switching to a lesser-known browser like Opera or Chrome,
you'll still know what they're doing online.
SpyAgent monitors web surfing in:
- Microsoft Internet Explorer
- America Online (AOL)
- Mozilla Firefox
- Google Chrome
- Netscape
- Opera
- Flock
SpyAgent also keeps track of how long each user visits each website, so parents can easily see which websites were visited for the longest period of time.
Social Media Websites Monitoring
Many parents are more than a little concerned what their kids are doing at sites like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, and Friendster, and what details
about what they're doing and saying at these sites and who their friends are.
For monitoring these social sites, SpyAgent relies on two of its core features: website monitoring, keylogging, and screen capture.
Given how important these three features are, and that SpyAgent has them all, it's safe for us to say that even though SpyAgent takes a different--some
would say less elegant--approach than some competitors do, parents can still see what their kids are doing on the social networking sites.
Search Engine / Search History Monitoring
SpyAgent monitors the search history of the PC in question, so parents can see what their kids are looking for online.
Parents can also search the activity logs for specific keywords to make sure that questionable or dangerous information isn't finding its way to their children.
SpyAgent's reporting feature can also be configured to offer parents the "Top 10 Online Searches."
This feature is very useful for parents of older kids who may know how to cover their tracks by deleting their search history.
Website Blocking
Next in importance to website monitoring for many parents is website blocking, where parents use parental control software to help prevent their kids from seeing
pornography or other sites deemed inconsistent with their family values.
SpyAgent's website blocking is, like all of its filtering tools, neither the best nor the worst.
It's similar in function to that of
Spector Pro and
eBlaster, but in addition to the ability to block sites by URL, it also includes the ability to block based on keywords in website addresses, too, which is a step up from either Spector program.
However, there aren't any of the more sophisticated categories of filtering that help parents keep their kids off of sites they don't like, such as those with violent imagery or that include references to drugs and alcohol.
Parents can choose to block sites after they've reviewed them in the activity logs, but many parents would prefer that their children never gain access to such sites in the first place. Blocking after the fact can still be effective, but doesn't provide the more pro-active type of parental controls that so many parents prefer.
This means the SpyAgent system isn't as flexible as either
Net Nanny or
WebWatcher, both of which have excellent website blocking.
Records Instant Messages (IM/Chat)
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SpyAgent records both sides of all chat conversations made on all the major chat clients, including:
- AOL/AIM
- MSN Messenger
- Windows Messenger
- Google Talk
- Skype
- ICQ
A good chat monitor, as SpyAgent has, allows parents to see exactly what their child is saying online, and to whom.
Instant messaging reports in SpyAgent are easy to read, detailed, and fairly well organized.
We weren't huge fans of the pop-up windows used to show the conversations, rather than showing the messages in an adjacent pane to the message overview, as some
competitors do.
Once you've used competing interfaces like WebWatcher's for viewing chat conversations, SpyAgent's user interface, while decent overall, will likely seem dated
and archaic to use.
That said, it is functional and gets the job done.
Parents can choose to block a particular chat/instant messaging partner once they've decided that the person in question is inappropriate.
However, SpyAgent doesn't block particular words or phrases, and parents may need to do a lot of legwork to stay on top of who their child is talking to.
Records Email and Attachments
Once again SpyAgent does well here. All emails and attachments are recorded, so parents can see who their child is contacting, and what has been sent or received.
SpyAgent also records all messages from most of the major webmail providers, including Gmail, Yahoo! Mail, AOL, Hotmail, and MySpace webmail.
This is great--and a must--for parents who have older kids trying to send messages from these web-based email services.
Invisible Keylogger
SpyAgent's invisible keylogger is a good one whose quality rivals that of
WebWatcher and the
Spector/
eBlaster monitoring software from Spector Soft.
For us a keylogger is an
exceedingly important tool in the parental control tool chest. Good software key loggers like SpyAgent's allow parents to see
everything typed on the PC in question.
This is a great way to catch the usernames and passwords used to access inappropriate sites.
The keylogger in SpyAgent also captures special keys and functions like tab functions, though it can be confusing to slog through all the information when it's presented to the parent.
Fortunately, SpyAgent compensates for this with a neat new feature called SmartLogging.
SmartLogging allows parents to create a list of trigger keywords. When the program recognizes the use of a trigger keyword, it begins recording, saving busy parents from having to read through a lot of extraneous information.
Real-Time Screenshots
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SpyAgent takes screenshots of everything that happens on your desktop according to criteria selected by the parent.
This can include:
- specific intervals of time
- whenever the mouse is clicked
- whenever specific websites are visited
Screenshot recording can be configured to begin and/or increase its capture frequency when window captions containing specific keywords are accessed, allowing parents to get to the correct information when they need it.
Set Computer Usage Limits
SpyAgent sets computer usage limits that can lock down an entire PC for a set period of time.
This is great for parents who don't want their kids using the computer when they're not around, at night, or at other times when they shouldn't.
Likewise, SpyAgent's usage limits can't be defined on a per-progrm basis, which likewise means there isn't a function that allows parents to lock down the
Internet, while leaving the PC itself available for use.
Kids who need to work on a report or who have other PC work to get done would still have Internet access so long as the computer was not scheduled for shutdown.
Remote Monitoring
Remote monitoring can be hard to find in parental control software; good remote monitoring is even harder still to find.
SpyAgent tries hard to get remote monitoring right and offers a variety of remote options but doesn't quite pull it off.
Effectively speaking, there are three ways of getting remote monitoring with SpyAgent and problems with each:
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remote monitoring method
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drawbacks
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logs via email
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- inherently insecure
(Messages are sent unencrypted across the Internet, with the possibility of exposing private data to others.)
- requires sifting through email to get to items you're concerned about
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logs via FTP
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- inherently insecure
- FTP may be password protected, but usernames and passwords to your FTP server are sent unencrypted
- messages are sent unencrypted across the Internet, with the possibility of exposing private data to others
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requires downloading data from FTP server anytime you want to view what's happening on the PC you're monitoring.
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logs viewed via a website SpyAgent sets up on IP of the monitored PC itself
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- requires that you know the IP address of the computer you're monitoring
- requires that the PC you're monitoring is powered on when you want to view its logs
- inbound access to the machine from elsewhere on the Internet may be blocked by:
- your ISP
- your router
- your firewall
- IP addresses are often subject to frequent changes. Access now may not work in 2 days or even 2 minutes.
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Invisibility/Stealth
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Whether or not you
need an invisible parental control program with top-notch stealth or not shouldn't matter.
What
should matter is that the application you're running has that ability.
For quite some time SpyAgent was among the leaders in stealthy spy software, but the antivirus / antispyware vendors caught up, and it became all too easy to
ferret out that a computer had SpyAgent installed on it.
Since then SpyAgent has done much to improve their stealth mode this time around.
It is much harder to find and can optionally be setup to be invisible in the Windows Task Manager. Good stuff.
This is a key feature for parents who don't want their kids to know that their online behavior is being watched.
Tech Support
Many parents say their kids are more computer savvy than they are.
Unlike some competitors, SpyAgent seems to do a very good bordering on excellent job with tech support.
In addition to mastery of the program they're supporting, the three things we like to see for tech support are:
- multiple methods to get support
- telephone support available
- good hours of operation
This is where strong tech support can make the difference in making parental control software excellent vs. just "good."
We're happy to report that on each of these fronts SpyAgent's tech support excels.
- phone, email, and online FAQs are available
- their team is available by phone Monday through Friday, 9am to 7pm EST
- aside from phone support, email support is also available 24x7, where they try to get back to customers within 12 to 24 hours.
SpyAgent Review Conclusion
While SpyAgent has some pretty nifty tools to offer in their parental control software suite, we still feel there are a few things they could work on.
First of all, there isn't any particular focus on social networking sites like Myspace and Facebook.
Parents can look for social networking sites when they run through the screenshots and logs of their child's PC use, but for parents of older kids who want
something more there isn't anything to offer them.
Kids today spend so much time interacting with others in these venues, that it really makes sense for any good parental control software program to offer
some tools specifically designed to help parents make sure that their kids aren't communicating with dangerous predators or suffering as victims of cyber bullies.
We also found that SpyAgents reporting system could be streamlined a bit. There are pop-ups to constantly open and close, for instance, where there really
are other better ways to present the data.
Sometimes, particularly when you're new to the software, it may get downright confusing reading all of the the logs because there are so many special controls
imbedded within them.
As for remote monitoring, SpyAgent does have it; however, it requires an upgrade to their "SpyAnywhere Suite" whose solutions are better left to those more
technically adept than most parents we encounter at our site are.
Most parents want three things from parental control software: fast, easy, thorough.
SpyAgent's remote monitoring
is there and is flexible, but most parents will find it's none of the above compared to the best parental control software
offerings from WebWatcher.
All-in-all, SpyAgent gives parents a complete set of monitoring tools, including ones that aren't found in other leading products like
Net Nanny.
That said, these same tools are all found in WebWatcher, too, which has far better remote monitoring (among other things) for just $15 more.
For parents to whom the $15 is a significant hurdle, SpyAgent is still a good solution; for parents to whom the $15 isn't a significant hurdle,
WebWatcher,
Spector Pro,
or
eBlaster may be better choices.
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Parental Controls
