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Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

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Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#121

Post by user5994461 »

Someone1234 wrote: post #109

Chromebooks cannot print. Everyone loves to recommend Chromebooks to older/less digitally literate people, and they're right to do so in most situations. However Chromebooks have one huge downside that makes them non-starters for some of that demographic: Printing is a no-go. And don't tell me about "Google Cloud Print." Cloud Printing requires a PC or Mac connected to the printer and a copy of the Chrome browser run…

> Chromebooks cannot print.

+1. I can vouch for that.

Source: We bought 5 chromebooks to trial at our company.

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#122

Post by dajohnson89 »

jonwachob91 wrote: post #92
Raphmedia wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ever been to those "super-awesome-hd-wallaper.com" websites? They are FILLED with ads, popups, etc. Instead, you can safely download one of the top wallpaper torrent package on Pirate Bay and get thousands of good quality wallpapers.

Or ya know... Google Images...

Is it that hard for you to accept that people use different tools to accomplish the same task?

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#123

Post by spikej »

GeneticGenesis wrote: post #37
nickcw wrote: post #20

How about a Chromebook? Cheap, keeps itself up to date, fully cloud based. It wouldn't tick the Lightroom box but it does the internet based stuff extremely well with low maintenance.

I do this for my family these days, virtually zero maintainance. Biggest word of warning though is that Google are totally happy to change things with no warning or how or why, which can be very confusing. For example, they stopped a direct route to import photos from an SD card or alike to google photos. No automated replacement workflow.

That's the biggest concern: being able to use the interface the way you have for ages without having to RE-familiarize yourself. This seems to be a harder hurdle for non-technical older folks. The gmail app interface changing every so often on android tablet would cause parents so much confusion that I finally replaced the tablet with a linux laptop with thunderbird

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#124

Post by spikej »

philip1209 wrote: post #70

Have you considered using OpenDNS? They used to focus just on protecting family members from internet threats, and it's still a great (paid) product for that: https://www.opendns.com/home-internet-security/

Or private internet access VPN (https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2016/07/pia-adds-...)

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#125

Post by Diederich »

xd1936 wrote: post #97
walrus01 wrote: post #87

give them a desktop that is basically xubuntu amd64 (xfce4 desktop on xorg) + firefox + chrome, and then install all of the best adblock extensions in both browsers. Even the most clueless parents can't successfully download and run windows binary malware/ransomeware/viruses on that. the xfce4 GUI is close enough to traditional windows98/windows2000/winXP models that most older non technical users have no problem wit…

That eliminates Lightroom support, however.

https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=applicatio... shows it as 'gold' for the currently highest 32 bit version.

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#126

Post by dsego »

faitswulff wrote: post #8

I was really hoping for a discussion on how to keep parents from watching videos about the healing properties of crystals and government chemtrail conspiracies... ...but to answer your question perhaps you can get your parents a Chromebook? I'm not sure what photo editing options exist on the platform, but hopefully it's an obscure enough platform to avoid the majority of malware.

Why would people lie on the internet? - my mom

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#128

Post by chadgeidel »

daddykotex wrote: post #71
rwhitman wrote: post #66

My mom has had various Windows PCs since the late 90's. About every 3 to 6 months or so I get a call that it's "stopped working" and has either locked up completely or is moving at a crawl. Nearly every time it takes me hours if not days to do a bunch of scans, install updates and purge whatever garbage has been installed by various malware that she's somehow managed to find. I've done more than a few clean wipes, bo…

I'm genuinely not sure this is a Windows problem. They might get infected on pretty much any OS if they navigate anywhere without precautions (as most parents do, including mine). I'd like to see if a something like DeepFreeze could help here (there are probably alternatives here, DeepFreeze just came first in my mind).

It's absolutely not a Windows problem, my dad managed to click through some "malware" (i didn't see it, but i'm thinking it was a cleverly crafted web page) and give his credit card to someone... on his iPad.

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#129

Post by rthille »

Haegin wrote: post #106
ralphc wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also assuming you live close enough to your parents that you can go over and physically revive a bricked computer.

There's got to be money in a service where a company provides your parents with a computer that's set up to be pretty user friendly and safe. If they brick it, the computer is replaced. The company manages the machine so backups are handled and the new machine will be pretty close to whatever they lost wherever possible (in terms of content on the machine). If the hardware gets damaged that'd have to be paid for I gu…

Yeah, Google provides that service and many manufacturers sell the products which make use of it. (chromebooks)

Re: Ask HN: How do I protect my parents from the internet?

#130

Post by uabstraction »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #32

tldr: Linux. I had more or less the same issue (except things still booted) with my parents about 5 or 6 years ago. In a move I thought was insane, I put them on Xubuntu. I moved them to Mint for a while, but they are back to Xubuntu. It's my preferred distro, and the Ubuntu base (for good support) and XFCE (Windows familiarity) made me comfortable it was Mom and Dad proof. Aside from showing them where things are, t…

Darktable is where it's at. I also haven't used Lightroom for more than 5 minutes, but Darktable covers all my RAW developing needs. If you're not shooting for money, it should suffice. (If you ARE shooting professionally, it might(?) fall short, but I only shoot for myself.)
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