So as I was wandering the vastness that is CES I get a hangouts message from my good friend Stormy Beach of AndroidSPIN. Something along the lines of, dude there’s a couple of amazing things you should see over here. So I scurried over to his location and we took a look at a few things here and there. But the real treasure he wanted me to witness was Kurio phones and tablets for kids. As a father of four kids and one on the way as well as a technogeek who has too many electronics. My kids know how to work tablets, smartphones and computers. The youngest, at 20 months old, is pretty proficient already.
We currently have a Nexus 7, Dell Venue 8 and LG G Slate that they all use to play games and watch Netflix. And of course as any good parent would, we police their usage and content so they don’t get into things they shouldn’t. But that takes time and it takes constant vigilance. There are custom launchers like Zoodles that have some decent functionality to help in these matters but there is a subscription fee involved.
Kurio is the solution for those families who want a dedicated phone or tablet for their children. Kurio has tons of parental options from setting a timer for tablet playtime to blocking content and ads. Read the press release below and you’ll get the idea.
Contact Management
Parents can manage a child’s contacts, allowing or blocking certain contacts. If parents choose to maintain a safe list of contacts, kids may add contacts to their device, but they won’t be able to call or message them until mom or dad adds them to the list of allowable numbers.
Primary Contacts
Parents can create up to five primary contacts that aren’t subject to any restrictions and can also receive alerts. For example, mom, dad, grandma, grandpa and older siblings.
Phone Use
Parents can set daily, weekly or monthly call-time limits and also limit the child’s number of text messages. They can also access the child’s call log, text message and Internet browsing history. In order to respect the child’s privacy, the content of MMS and text messages is not displayed. Though, Kurio Genius will provide tools to control message content.
Application Management
Parents can choose which applications are allowed, blocked or restricted by the calendar. Newly downloaded applications are blocked by default.
Calendar
Parents can set restricted times by day of the week during which calls, SMS messages and restricted applications are to be blocked.
Geolocation
Using Kurio Phone’s GPS tracking technology, parents can monitor their child’s position every 15, 30 or 60 minutes, including his or her current position or last known position.
Geofencing
Parents can also pre-define secure and danger zones on a map, and set the days and times when these zones are activated. If the child leaves a secure zone or enters a danger zone, the parent will receive an alert.
In Case of Emergency (I.C.E.)
Parents can store the child’s information, including date of birth, allergies, blood type, as well as a doctor’s name and phone number, which can be accessed on the device in case of emergency. A child can alert emergency services and their primary contacts in case of emergency, and also trigger a silent alarm by repeatedly pressing the “power” button when in danger.
Theft/Loss
In the event of theft or loss, parents can remotely trigger an alarm on the device, block the phone completely so that it cannot be used, erase the device’s data, set it to take a picture at phone start up, display a message on the device’s screen, and even track the device’s current location.
Other Alerts
Parents can also receive alerts via SMS or e-mail notifying them when the child’s phone is turned on/off, when it has a low battery, or even when the device’s SIM card has been changed.
Kurio Phone’s password protected parental controls are built into the device and parents can access them remotely from a computer or another device. No subscription is required.
Kurio Phone will run on the Android 4.2 (Jellybean) operating system and provide all the features kids expect from a sophisticated device: a multi-core processor and 1 GB RAM to have a fluid interface and experience, a 480 x 800 4” screen, front and rear-facing cameras, 3G, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, GPS, FM radio and 4 GB of internal memory for their apps and files (expandable to 36 GB with a micro SD card). Kurio Phone will come in a sleek black design with either red or blue trim.
Kurio is not for those users looking for a system update every time a new version of Android comes out. Kurio is made for kids and this is by far one of the best solutions I have seen on the market. Check out Kurio’s website for more, hit the link below.
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Last Updated on January 23, 2017.
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