Filter Visibility?

[Wise]

Hello. If you have checked my journal, you would know that I am one of the youngest members on this site (early teens), so I have had to keep my P addiction away from my family, friends, etc. for the 3-4 years that it has plagued me. It is now recovery time (yay), but I've made the decision to keep this secret as well. Who knows, I may end up regretting that decision, but to be honest, I'm not in a rock-bottom position where I've got nothing to lose. If I were to tell my parents about my P addiction, there is a pretty big chance that they'll take it the wrong way, and my up-front life will be thrown into chaos.

So that brings me to the issue of recovery strategies. So far, my idea of constant distraction (as unanimously suggested by the anti-P guides that I've been reading as of late) is working out well, but I know that temptations will come in, and maybe drive me to type in the name of a dirty site...

Here's the issue. Most everyone on this forum has suggested that I use an anti-P blocker, such as K-9, but there's an issue with that. My computer isn't exactly the most private computer in the household - while it is my private laptop, I'll have the occasional person use it for a search or whatnot. That does get me a little antsy, but that's not the point. I'm just wondering here - if I were install one of these anti-P blockers, would there be a chance of someone discovering it and my history being thrown out into the open?

To add to my problems, there's one more variable to the equation. As you all know there are three main browsers out there for Windows: Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, and Google Chrome (they get better in that order, just sayin' ). I just recently switched to Chrome, for an irrelevant reason. When watching P, I wouldn't use Chrome (it tracks and stores the history, saving it to one's Google account, and I was (and still am) unsure if others can see it) or Explorer (actually, I don't use it for anything). However, Mozilla is fairly private, and there's a nice little 'delete recent history' button that I used and abused throughout my P years. I still use it to go on TTF, since hey, better cover. So, really, my two questions are:

1. Does K-9 work for all browsers? Explorer, Firefox, and Chrome?
2. How visible is it? Is a blocked site message only going to show up time and time again, or is there going to be a little K-9 logo hovering above the screen constantly?

Thanks, guys.

- W

[samski]

W - here are my responses:

1. Does K-9 work for all browsers? Explorer, Firefox, and Chrome? yes - it works at the "network" level, filtering all traffic, so it doesn't matter which browser you're using.
2. How visible is it? - it all depends on what you filter and what is accessed. Is a blocked site message only going to show up time and time again, or is there going to be a little K-9 logo hovering above the screen constantly? If you set it to a "strict" setting", it may pop up a lot, also - it probably will "K-9" / block out parts of web pages that contain ads, so it may be a little more visible than you would like. There is a "k-9" quick link button that will be placed on Internet Browser's quick launch bar, but you can delete it.


Depending upon how much you need filtered, others may never see it, unless they try to go to "bad" places. If it does show up, you can tell them that you are using it to keep you from accidentally stumbling upon internet garbage, which is true.

I use internet filtering software on all of our family's computers since we have children and adults on them, and I don't want them to stumble upon bad things, or be able to seek bad stuff out.

[Steelerfan27]

Wise

I agree with samski. You can install the filter on your laptop and just say you had some annoying popups or misleading webpage links that you don't want to see and stuff like that...or just tell them you have an internet gambling problem (jk):) Also, I recommend going in Google image search settings and setting it to safe search. there's a way to sort of lock you compy into safe search, but I forget how. Beat this problem now so you aren't putzing around and still dealing with it when your nearing 30 like me.

[Noname1969]

You can use Opendns, it works by not resolving the sites. It won't block some P sites but it catches most of them. Opendns has something called "Family Shield" it automatically blocks P. Best part it's free. Simply google Opendns and go there and find out how to change your dns on your machine. You can get a free account on Opendns and install an updater, this way you can block sites with more control. Nice thing nobody will know about it.