Covenant Eyes has just released a brand new version of Covenant Eyes for Windows users (the Mac version isn’t far behind).
This new version of Covenant Eyes will help Accountability Partners to read and interpret Accountability Reports.
Distinguishing Between Visited vs. Supporting Websites
Every website is made up of dozens or even hundreds of web addresses (URLs). Every photo, every link, every video, every Facebook “like” button, every “Tweet This,” and every ad have their own address online. There are also many URLs that make up the behind-the-scenes structure of a webpage.
In the past, Covenant Eyes treated all of these web addresses similarly: any of them could appear on Accountability Reports. Now we are distinguishing between “Visited” and “Supporting” web addresses.
▪ Visited sites are any websites that appear in the address bar of your browser (the site you actually opened). ▪ Supporting entries are all the secondary URLs that compose the primary one (all the links, images, ads, and behind-the-scenes stuff).
Accountability Reports will now draw attention to Visited sites, dramatically cutting down the length of most Reports.
The Supporting sites will still be available in the Detailed Browsing Logs and marked as such.
Unconfirmed Websites
Right now, the URLs that appear as Visited or Supporting are those that are accessed using the top three most popular Windows browsers: Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer.
All websites visited through other browsers (for instance, Opera or Safari), or websites access on non-Windows devices, will appear on Accountability Reports as “Unconfirmed.”
In addition, programs like Skype, Dropbox, or iTunes also access the Internet, but aren’t web browsers. We monitor that traffic as well and report it as Unconfirmed.
Other Improvements for Windows Users
This update also brings some other improvements
▪ Compatibility with Windows 8 and 8.1 ▪ Improved compatibility with previously tricky hotspots ▪ Improved compatibility with antivirus software ▪ Improved connectivity in places where Covenant Eyes is conflicting with firewalls
What this means for Accountability Users
Aside from all the improvements you should see connecting to the Internet, the changes on the Accountability Reports should improve your accountability conversations considerably.
▪ Windows users will no longer be dinged for those links or secondary items on a page that you didn’t click. If you visit an otherwise benign webpage that happens to have a link to a questionable site (and you don’t click on that link), it will not appear in the High Ratings section of your Accountability Report. ▪ Make sure to use either Chrome, Firefox, or Internet Explorer to give your Accountability Partners maximum clarity on the Reports. You can use other browsers but this means your Reports will contain more Unconfirmed URLs.
What this means for Accountability Partners
The new Reports will be much easier to understand.
▪ You will be able to tell the difference between intentional browsing and incidental links. When a website is labeled “Visited” you know the the person you hold accountable went to that page specifically. When a website in the Detailed Logs is labeled “Supporting” you know it was not clicked. ▪ If you still want to drill down deep and see the Supporting sites, you can do that in the Detailed Browsing Log. All the sites with their labels and ratings will be clearly listed.
What this means for Filter Guardians
We know a lot of parents and other Filter Guardians want to know about not just the choices someone made online but the potential temptations they faced. To these people, Supporting sites are still very important: they want to know when a racy ad popped up or when a mature news story appeared in the sidebar.
▪ The Filter will still block all sites that are rated higher than your Filter Sensitivity Level, regardless of whether is it Visited or Supporting. This means highly rated ads or photos will still not appear on the screen. ▪ The Blocked Sites portion of the Report will still list not just the Visited sites, but also the Supporting sites. So you’ll still know right away if a racy ad was blocked.
Update Your Software
Get the latest version of Covenant Eyes for Windows! We recommend you uninstall your current version and then install the newest version.
This is a message from Covenant Eyes Blog, posted by Luke Gilkerson.
January 13, 2014 at 12:48 pm
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