keylogger to spy on daughter ? (A Bit of a Quandary)
 

I had a little question, one of my friends is scared that his 14-year old daughter is talking to some sketchy people online and since her Mac is strictly off bounds for him and family, he can't be sure.

He was wondering if there's a key logger for the Mac so he can keep a tab on her. Something preferably with a remote ghost install? So that he can mail it to her and it installs itself and either uploads the info to an FTP site or sends it back to him via e-mail?

Thanks in advance!

Don't you think that would represent a huge security hole if that was actually possible? Think about it. What would stop a spammer from doing the same thing to you? No - you can't remote ghost install a keylogger via email! Even if it were possible, I certainly wouldn't post that information for all to see.

I don't know the full situation that your friend and his daughter are in, but I suspect that there is a more diplomatic way to solve the situation. Even if your friend doesn't have access to his daughter's computer (perhaps she lives with her mom or another guardian), unless she is emancipated (highly unlikely at age 14), there must be an adult with access to the computer. Perhaps he can try to make an ally out of that said adult.

create an account w/o admin rights that way you can control the internet settings.

Have you ever watched Cops? Have you ever noticed the people getting arrested all say the same thing?

Yeah...like I have a friend who likes to take Ecstasy at raves, you know? He asked me if I knew where he could get some good X...I promise, it wasn't for me...honest...I'm only asking for my friend...I would never use illegal drugs, officer...my friend does drugs, not me...I hope you don't think I'm trying to trick you so I can have it for myself...I was getting it for my friend who needed my help...

@kkamann
Wha...? </confused>

@g.raunak
This question has been asked many times before:
http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=66450
http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=87466
http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=52886
http://forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=90956

There are possibly many other ways to deal with this situation.
Here's a quote fron user JDV:

I think having the parents spy on her will probably make her distrust them further.

Also, I believe people are becoming too paranoid about issues like this. Read this for an example:

"Father-of-three branded a 'pervert' - for photographing his own children in public park"
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...blic-park.html

However, this does not mean that I don't believe that your friend's daughter is talking to some "sketchy people", as it is definitely a possibility.

Yeah, I guess you guys are right. I should just tell him to talk to her. He was the one who suggested a keylogger (I actually had to look up what the term meant :o)

ah, teenagers...



(ironic. no?)

The problem is that too many adults don't want to be the parent. Face reality: part of your job as a parent is checking up on your children. Your children will try to use the straw man of 'trust' to throw you off track. The fact is that if the daughter had earned trust, there would be no need for, nor even a thought of using a keylogger.

Parents need to spy on kids when the kids can't be trusted, and let's be honest, that is almost all kids at some point in their lives.

Edit:
To clarify, I don't think a parent should surreptitiously install a key logger. I think they should take the system away for a period of time because the child has tried to make her own rules: "her Mac is strictly off bounds for him and family." When she gets the system back, it should have full parental controls turned on, and she should not be given the administrator password. If the parents feel it necessary to install a key logger, they should do so, but tell her it's there and that they will be checking it. They could then explain that when she has earned their trust, the key logger will be turned off.

Not sure what you decided, but as far as I'm concerned, if you bought the computer, you have the right to know what its being used for. Check out logKext 2.2. Should do the trick if you decide to take that route.

If you can't trust her with something, you shouldn't buy it for her in the first place. I'd rather teach my child that money does not trump trust, rather than "I paid for it, I can do what I want".

These threads always debate the same points. Can we just have a standard "Do your trust your child/wife/dog around your computer, and what should you do if you don't?" thread, like Hayne's Unix FAQ? /maybesarcasm

And this is why every little girl should keep her diary in a locked box.

I have a pretty liberal and open view to things like this. To me, I think the parents should be parents and not blame the internet, the school systems, the neighborhood, or anything else for whatever problems their kids get into. After all, it is the parent's responsibility to look over the kids.

Now, since I work in education and have to deal with things like CIPA and erated technology regulated by the FCC, I have to meet certain standards and requirements for internet filtering. I learned a lot about internet filtering and have become acquainted with a few of the larger commercial products. I also understand the need to filter some content from children off of the Internet. Obviously, being a great parent doesn't stop your kid from stumbling onto some things they probably shouldn't until they are at least adults. I can agree with that.

A free product I have used in the past is called K-9 web protection, and there is a mac version out there, but it is currently in beta form. It is a content based internet filtering application that will filter all internet traffic based on its content. It is actually pretty decent, and if you disabled encrypted browsing it almost eliminates proxy based browsing.

http://www1.k9webprotection.com/getk9/beta.php

Every little girl who has not demonstrated that she can be trusted.

Even if, through some bleeding heart logic the parents are willing to leave the diary alone in this case, her computer is not a diary. It is a means by which all manner of cretins can reach her. By insisting that her parents not look at her computer she has demonstrated that she needs extra supervision. I can't say from here, but it's certainly possible that part of what needs to be done is a look through her diary too.

Children need to know and trust that their parents will do whatever is necessary to protect them. The most important duty of a parent is oversight.

I still won't forgive my parents for reading my diary when I was 8. Now multiply that by teenager.

Thanks for that one, TL. Just installed and checked out... SUPER.

I have set up a few things like this for clients in the past that wanted to have some sort of watch dog of what their kids use and do over the internet. I used to do things at the router level for my clients until one of my bosses pointed me to that product. I have to say it is pretty impressive for free. I still set up the router security as well, better to have layers of security over just one item. I guess in this case it is more of filtering than security. Also, if you use Open DNS (www.opendns.org) it will block a lot of those malicious sites automatically that may be filled with porn or whatever other inappropriate material for youngsters.

MacMinder comes highly recommended from vickishome ( a user here ). She's been there and done that with the entire child monitoring thing. End result:

Vicky has this to say about the "You should talk to your child, not spy on them" biblethumpers:

And my 18 y.o. family friend had this perspective:

First, I'm not a Biblethumper. Be careful about generalizing. Second, that rant seems like a lot of FUD to me.

So one kid (stupidly) willing to give up his privacy makes it okay? Kids should be taught that that the "if you have nothing to hide, you should let us search you and spy on you" mentality is something to be scared of.

It's an extreme end of a spectrum, guys, that it's acceptable. (And even then, only with caution.) Your son has a hard drug habit the family's been trying to deal with? Okay, the kid might have to be more transparent and be subject to regular and random room searches. That stuff is hard to handle. The "child predator" angle? Overblown, unless you're listening to Fox News and Dateline all the time.

A good, smart child taught the right things will surprise you. Don't teach them that trust is non-existent, or that it's acceptable to give up privacy for safety or security--because it's almost never the case that either is necessary.

Yes, lets be careful about generalizing. As we almost never have the whole story (including what's been tried and not worked) we shouldn't generalize that all children will respond to calm conversation and logic.

Secondly, lets try to stay on topic. This is a computing forum, not beabetterparent.com. The OP didn't ask about parenting technique (but he could have chosen a better word than "spy").

Open DNS is fairly good, but does have some holes, particularly for those of us stuck with a dynamic IP address. At login, software updates your IP to openDNS, but then it takes 5-10 minutes for that update to be pushed out to their servers. Also, openDNS is not a content filter. Unsavory sites have to be reported to them and there is a time lag.

K-9 works well. For example, a google search for "porn" returns "no sites found." openDNS will return all the sites and one need only start clicking away to find one that is not yet blocked. That said, openDNS will block most disreputable sites that do not have objectionable content, but have been reported as dangerous, fraudulent or known to be virus infected.

Using both would seem to be prudent for the curious little ones' protection.

It is naive to believe that you can separate "do the right thing" from "how can I spy on my daughter with the computer". Sorry. These threads always go this way. (Notice I wasn't even the one who started it.)

These threads, honestly, should be closed on sight and linked to previous versions of this topic.