I'm currently using a Linksys EA4500 wireless router at home, and as my grade-school kids use wifi internet devices more and more, I'm interested in keeping a close watch on what they end up seeing.
I have already set up Open DNS' "Family Shield" - basically it won't resolve addresses of adult sites, which is (for me) most of the challenge solved right there. But I'd still like to keep watch on the kids and what they are exposed to online.
The EA4500's logging capabilities with the original firmware are pretty weak:
- The log is not recorded indefinitely and only retains the last 20-30 page requests.
- Only the LAN-side IP, internet IP, and the service/port number are recorded. No text URLs, not even a datetime stamp.
I could update the firmware (to Cisco's CloudConnect/Smart Wifi) but I understand that this would just make the logging continuous (good!) but won't expand the detail that the EA4500 records (bad).
So my question is, is there a router that retains a relatively rich log but otherwise performs as well or better than the EA4500 in terms of throughput? I realize software exists that would permit pretty extensive capture, for example capturing text entered into search boxes and chat windows, etc., but I don't think we need quite that level of surveillance. Yet!
I have already set up Open DNS' "Family Shield" - basically it won't resolve addresses of adult sites, which is (for me) most of the challenge solved right there. But I'd still like to keep watch on the kids and what they are exposed to online.
The EA4500's logging capabilities with the original firmware are pretty weak:
- The log is not recorded indefinitely and only retains the last 20-30 page requests.
- Only the LAN-side IP, internet IP, and the service/port number are recorded. No text URLs, not even a datetime stamp.
I could update the firmware (to Cisco's CloudConnect/Smart Wifi) but I understand that this would just make the logging continuous (good!) but won't expand the detail that the EA4500 records (bad).
So my question is, is there a router that retains a relatively rich log but otherwise performs as well or better than the EA4500 in terms of throughput? I realize software exists that would permit pretty extensive capture, for example capturing text entered into search boxes and chat windows, etc., but I don't think we need quite that level of surveillance. Yet!
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