There seems to be no escaping our connected world and these days, you even see toddlers holding onto tablets or smartphones engrossed in videos or playing mobile games.

It’s not healthy for anyone to be constantly on mobile devices, but if you’re a parent with kids you’re even more conscious.

Though mobile devices and the Internet can be our friends, they can also be our greatest foes especially when we don’t have control over what our kids are consuming on these handheld devices. Now, there’s new hardware from Circle Media that looks to solve all that.

Circle with Disney

This new hardware appears to be a pretty harmless cube, but it gives parents the power to control the Internet. The tiny cube allows parents to set time limits, pause the Internet, see what you’re kids are accessing, and so much more.

Circle Media, the company behind the hardware, started as a team of three: a former creative consultant, photographer and videographer Jelani Memory, CTO Tiebing Zhang; and Lance Charlish. They launched a Kickstarter PBC campaign for Circle in 2013, but unfortunately it was not successfully funded. Losing out on Kickstarter may be the best thing that could have happened with the company, as two years later, the device is ready for purchase and they have a partnership with Disney (The Walt Disney Company).

Circle with Disney pairs with your home Wi-Fi network, and using an iOS app, parents can customize Internet access for each device used within the home. It charges via USB and each charge lasts a few days.

Features

Time limit

Using your iPhone, you can set time limits on each device. If you put a one hour restriction on Facebook, it is smart enough to add up Facebook time on the mobile app and on the computer, so when your kid hits the one hour limit, access to Facebook gets cut off across all devices. Same goes with a general one hour time limit; no matter what apps are used or what websites are visited, once time is up, it’s up.

You can also set categories to make it easier to set time restrictions for your family. You get notified when someone reaches their time limit. This can also teach your kids how to manage their time on the Internet wisely as they can check how much time they have spent on an app, or how long have they been on a certain website, and how much time is still remaining before their access to apps and the Internet gets cut off.

Filter

You can customize what each individual in your family can access on your devices from. There are four presets offered: Pre-K, Kid, Teen and Adult, that have default settings and approved content for each age group. Aside from that, you can also filter popular apps and platforms so you’re sure that your kids won’t be able to access content meant for adults. It also blocks ads, and you can set it so only returns kid-friendly search results on Google.

Pause and Bedtime

These two features will make you feel like an internet god, as you can take away the Internet as you please. If you feel like your whole family is ignoring you, glued to mobile devices, just hit pause to get their attention – you’ve cut off everyone’s internet access. You can also set which devices are on pause. As for bedtime, you can set a period of time when Internet access is not allowed, say from 11 PM to 6AM, to make sure your kids aren’t just pretending to be asleep.

Insight

This allows you to see how long your kids are spending their time on certain apps or websites and compare their usage on a weekly basis. This allows you to make more informed decisions like shortening or lengthening time limits, or even giving them a reward because they no longer spend three house on Facebook each day.

Circle with Disney is now available for only $99.

More control

Another device that shares similar features with Circle with Disney is Luma, a new device that boosts your data speed as well as make sure that there are no dead zones in your home.

The device allows parents to easily see who are connected to the network, set restrictions, and even block or revoke access to the network. It also allows content customization per device so that your kids won’t be able to access sites and apps meant for adults.

Image souce: Circle with Disney