Parental controls are not megabits

Every generation of broadband has sold safety as a speed, or speed as a safety. They are not cousins. A 900 Mbit line will fetch the same unwise page faster. A hub filter will try to stop some of those pages while the child is on that hub, and none of them when the child is on 5G at the bus stop. Parenting is a set of tools at the right layer. The drop is not a layer.

Layers

Device and account (the phone, the tablet, the school login). Hub/DNS (only on that radio). ISP filter (only when you use their path). Network plant (irrelevant).

Start at the device the child carries. Add hub tools as a backstop at home. Do not start at a 24-month fibre because a brand once ran a safety advert.

Switching with filters in mind

If you rely on a retailer’s filter, ask how to recreate it on the gainer before you cease. Own-router households should already be device-first.

A worse year on a ‘family’ brand is a dear filter. Buy the year, keep the device tools.

Speed is not safety

Uploading a family photo backup faster is not safeguarding. Neither is gigabit gaming.

If the house needs a filter project, do the project on a Saturday. Do not add it to a switching panic on a Tuesday.

A gigabit will not parent. A filter will not splice. Buy each from the shop that sells it.

Parenting tools and last miles are different invoices. Pay for both if you need both. Do not confuse them on a comparison table.