Parental control software can monitor a child's every online action or clamp down limits on what activities are permitted. Not all parents want that kind of rigid control, but if the child winds up chatting with a pedophile or getting bullied they'll surely want to know. WebSafetyPC ($9.99/month, direct) works very hard to detect dangerous or inappropriate chat while preserving the child's privacy. It's extraordinarily comprehensive in its IM service coverage; I haven't seen anything to compare. But that's the only thing it does well.

Pricing and Packages
WebSafety offers a number of protection packages. For $9.99/month you can protect one PC with WebSafetyPC or one cell phone with the company's CellSafety 2.0 ($9.99/month direct). A $14.99/month bundle protects three devices, either PCs or phones. And the $39.99/month family plan lets you protect an unlimited number of devices.

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I am a bit concerned about those prices. For $19.99/year you can protect three home computers with Editors' Choice AVG Family Safety ($19.95 direct for three licenses, 4.5 stars), and its Whole House option extends protection to all devices on the home network. Windows Live Family Safety 2011 (Free, 3 stars) is free, and Norton Online Family Premier ($49.99 direct, 4 stars) offers a free edition.

WebSafetyPC handles IM monitoring better than any parental control product I've seen, but ZoneAlarm SocialGuard ($19.99 direct for five licenses, 4 stars) handles Facebook dangers better than the competition and costs just $19.99/year. In this economy, how many families can spend $480/year for the family package, or $120/year to protect a single device?

WebSafety PC Scanner
Anyone can download and run the free WebSafety PC Scanner. The scanner searches IM logs and browser history for evidence of misbehavior, and also searches for suspicious filenames. On completion it offers a summary of its findings in general terms, for example "Possible arranged meeting with [name] on [date]", or "On-line bullying with [name] on [date]. To get the full details you must subscribe.

I ran the scanner on my own main PC and perused the very lengthy full report, which claimed 17 child safety violations. It flagged numerous IM conversations in which I arranged to meet with colleagues, which makes sense. It also accused my editor of bullying for saying "I'll shoot you the filename." Any appearance of the word "sex" in a Web page title got slapped down. And it disapproved of filenames containing the word "analyze."

You can use the scanner when deciding whether to sign up for WebSafetyPC. Just don't let a warning like "17 Child Safety Violations" frighten you, as some may not be violations at all.

Getting Started
Once you've signed up for an account and installed the WebSafetyPC software, a wizard walks through the initial configuration. Its first (and very important) step is to collect one or two parental cell phone number that will receive alerts. There's an option to add specific safe contacts whose conversations won't be monitored.

WebSafetyPC can keep the kids from sending out too-personal information such as the home address or phone. The wizard asks for this information, and of course you can add or edit it later. There's no multi-category Web content filtering, just a porn filter with three levels to choose from.

Once the wizard has finished, the product is active. Unlike many parental control systems it has no local user interface. All configuration and viewing of activity reports goes through the WebSafety online portal. According to the company, changes made online should take effect locally within two minutes.

Per-user configuration is based on Windows user accounts. WebSafetyPC automatically starts managing each account that logs in using default settings. If desired, you can fine tune each account's settings from the online portal.

Obsessed with IM
WebSafetyPC tracks and filters every popular instant messaging service, and it does so at the protocol level. I tried it with Yahoo, AIM, Facebook chat, and Google Talk; all those were covered. Because it works at the protocol level, the kids can't evade it by using a third-party chat client. In fact, unlike any other parental control program I've seen, WebSafety PC thoroughly monitors Web-only chat systems like meebo.com, AIM Express and Yahoo Messenger for the Web.

Parents will receive an alert via SMS and email if WebSafetyPC detects sexting, pedophile activity, cyberbullying, suicide talk, gun talk, or messages about drugs. If the child attempts to send personal data, WebSafetyPC simply terminates the IM client and alerts parents. Initially, I thought killing the client was bit heavy-handed. After some thought, I realized that no other solution could be universally applied across all known and unknown chat clients.