Abstract / Introduction

Smartphones have become essential devices across all age groups, from children to adults, offering seamless access to the internet, apps, and social platforms. However, this unrestricted access poses serious risks to children and teenagers, exposing them to inappropriate content, addictive gaming, and unsafe online interactions. This project proposes the development of a software framework that can monitor, detect, and restrict content exposure for children based on their age group.

The framework will include an Android-based monitoring app for the child's device, a parental control dashboard accessible via the web, and a backend server for data analysis and storage.

Project Objectives

• Age Detection – Estimate and verify the child's age using user profile data, images, and behaviour cues.
• Parental Control System – Enable parents to remotely monitor and control their child's smartphone usage.
• Content Restriction – Automatically block apps, games, and websites unsuitable for the child's age group.
• Suspicious Behaviour Detection – Analyse texting and calling patterns to identify risky interactions.
• Activity Monitoring – Log activities, capture device snapshots, and send them to the parent dashboard.
• Real-Time Alerts – Notify parents about critical behaviour, suspicious messages, or inappropriate app use.
• Data Security – Ensure encrypted and secure storage and transmission of sensitive data.

Functional Requirements

User & Relationship Management

• Parent registration and login.
• Linking multiple children to one parent account.

Age Group Detection

• Estimate child's age and assign restrictions accordingly.

App & Content Control

• Block apps/websites unsuitable for the child.
• Prevent app uninstallation and data clearance.
• Restrict access to device storage.

Suspicious Behaviour Monitoring

• Analyse messages and call logs for unsafe patterns.
• Flag critical behaviour for parental review.

Activity Reporting

• Capture and upload snapshots to the server.
• Log app usage and browsing activities.

Parental Dashboard

• Web interface for monitoring and controlling.
• Notifications for suspicious activities.
• Remote blocking/unblocking of apps.

Non-Functional Requirements

• Security – End-to-end encryption for all data.
• Performance – Monitoring should not significantly affect device speed.
• Scalability – Support multiple children per parent account.
• Usability – Simple and intuitive parent dashboard.
• Reliability – Continuous monitoring with minimal downtime.
• Compliance – Ethical data handling using only publicly available APIs.

Limitations

1. Restricted to public Android APIs (some features may not be fully supported).
2. Age detection accuracy may be limited in a prototype.
3. Cannot guarantee 100% filtering of harmful content.
4. Rooted/jailbroken devices may bypass protections.
5. The project is limited to a proof-of-concept for academic purposes.