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araym Author

Level 1

11 points

Parental Controls bug in Mountain Lion 10.8.2

For years I've used Parental Controls, not to restrict my daughter's web content, but to limit her time on the computer. But tonight I upgraded Mountain Lion from 10.8.1 to 10.8.2 and something broke.

Suddenly every secure web page she tries to access (to include google, gmail, amazon, etc.) fails. It says "Parental controls restricts access to secure websites".

A little hunting around turned up the following Apple Knowledge Base article: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2900 that says "https note: For websites that use SSL encryption (the URL will usually begin with https), the Internet content filter is unable to examine the encrypted content of the page. For this reason, encrypted websites must be explicitly allowed using the Always Allow list. Encrypted websites that are not on the Always Allow list will be blocked by the automatic Internet content filter."

I understand that logic however that should NOT apply to me since I'm not trying to automatically restrict her adult web content or create allowed/blocked site lists, etc. She has *unrestricted* web site access, so the Internet content filter shouldn't even be in play here.

Just to get this up and running, I did type the Admin account and password in at the prompt to let her gain access to the web pages. However that did not work. Even though it said it would now allow access - it did not.

I also tried going into Parental Controls, turning ON web site filtering, going into Custom, and adding in approved secure web sites (google, etc.) Even *that* did not work.

Everything was great until 10.8.2 came along but now her account is for all intents and purposes unusable.

Help? And thanks.

MacBook, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2), iPod touch 2nd gen 16GB, iPad 1st gen 3G 16GB

Posted on Sep 20, 2012 11:37 PM

186 replies

Sep 21, 2012 12:49 PM in response to araym

I guess Apple couldn't be bothered to test the Parental Controls with 10.8.2 because they were too busy adding Facebook integration. *roll eyes*

Mike

jsalino

Level 1

7 points

Sep 21, 2012 3:40 PM in response to araym

THIS *****.8.2

Sep 21, 2012 4:24 PM in response to Rembert Oldenboom

Hi. It's a little bit complicated for me to give you a precise answer since I'm french with french settings. The only way I got out of this problem was to switch any account to "unmanaged". No more parental control in preferences. They now have "calssic" accounts.

I then disabled access to safari by enabling it to me - read only - through information panel, acces rights area, and set "no access" to "everybody" group. This prevents my sons from opening this app.

I have then installed Firefox with "censureblock", "foxfilter", "procon latte", "publicfox" extensions and they access the web this way.

It's just a ttrick to wait for Apple to fond a solution, because they have no restrictions for emails and chat accounts now...

Clearly: the only way out is not to use parental control AT ALL. Disabling web controll is not enough. You do need to switch to unmanaged acount type until Apple thinks interesting to take care of that. Maybe we should write an email to Tim Cook ???

Sep 21, 2012 8:08 PM in response to araym

Same thing with us. We just set time limits for our kids on our Mac, not restrict websites.

We had to work around this bug by turning off Parental Controls completely.

In Systems Preferences > Parental Controls, we clicked the kid's name and then clicked the settings gear down at the bottom to turn off parental controls. That let our kids browse the web but is definitely not a long-term solution as we now have Parental Controls turned off.

araym Author

Level 1

11 points

Sep 21, 2012 8:17 PM in response to araym

It breaks not just browsers but other applications too that open up an SSL connection. Both Skype and the Kindle reader are also broken in 10.8.2 with ANY parental controls on.

Sep 22, 2012 12:27 AM in response to araym

Correct - it breaks multiplayer minecraft which my kids play because it uses ssl

Sep 22, 2012 1:27 AM in response to Peachpitter!

Yesterday I tried exactly that. Even let the kid login again. Didn't work, fiddled around to get it to work but finally I gave up. Today, after reboot, I disabled parental controls again for the kid and now it works.

From the Apple HT2900 article I read:

For websites that use SSL encryption (the URL will usually begin with https), the Internet content filter is unable to examine the encrypted content of the page. For this reason, encrypted websites must be explicitly allowed using the Always Allow list. Encrypted websites that are not on the Always Allow list will be blocked by the automatic Internet content filter.

Appearantly Apple has enforced this to unreasonable levels which probably is a good idea but it's way too cumbersome to allow access to all https websites by hand (and which doesn't solve the issue at hand). I actually don't want OS-X to examine the content of a page at all. There's no profanity filter in Parental Controls except at "Hide profanity in Dictionary" - which I turned off.

Sep 22, 2012 5:44 AM in response to araym

Yes, Spotify is useless with Parental Controls ON because it keeps asking for admin authorization. I have set no restrictions for web, only time limits.

OS X 10.8.0's blank youtube.com page was fixed with 10.8.2 but Parental Controls are still unusable!!

Sep 22, 2012 9:41 AM in response to araym

This is a big problem, as so many people in such a short amount of time have also said.

In the abstract, I understand Apple's thinking, but the real world implications are that an administrator must be on hand with a child whenever that child is at the computer. SSL is so prevalent, from simple user login workflows on websites to so many background networking activities for peer-to-peer game play. I don't want to have to walk over to the computer every few minutes to give authentication, especially when the computer does not appear to be remembering that I had already granted access to my child just a couple minutes before. And my kids hate having to ask over and over again to log in. I want Parental Controls to work, but I don't want the experience to be cumbersome and dreaded.

jsalino

Level 1

7 points

Sep 22, 2012 10:16 AM in response to araym

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4334030?tstart=0

Sep 22, 2012 12:54 PM in response to jsalino

When I tried that link just now, first I had to logon to discussions and second I received:

"It appears you're not allowed to view what you requested. You might contact your administrator if you think this is a mistake."

jsalino

Level 1

7 points

Sep 22, 2012 12:56 PM in response to Richard Outerbridge

Yes Apple removed it because it was critical of them

benjibar

Level 1

0 points

Sep 22, 2012 1:59 PM in response to araym

I have the same problem. I wish Apple could fix it. We need parental controls but with incessant popups about ssl it becomes unbearable and makes us switch it off.

JBakkies

Level 1

0 points

Sep 22, 2012 2:01 PM in response to araym

Same problem for me. Even when I disable parental control, firefox didn't work and constantly asked for adding the URL. Same site in Safari works fine when PC is disabled.

I hope that Apple will come with an update very soon.

tereora

Level 1

7 points

Sep 22, 2012 3:30 PM in response to araym

Im not clear from the threads above

Is this faulty software of incorrect logic?

I believe the former, because even when I enter Administrator credentials to authorise an SSL website - that authorisation is not remembered, and I end up in a feedback loop.

FWIW Apple I think you need to look at the whole user definition - it is so close and yet so far....

Why not tie user accounts to unique apple IDs, and using iCloud infrastructure allow login on any mac/iDevice with those credentials?

All families around the globe would rejoice as their iDevices would become ourDevices not I(my)Devices! Oh - hang on- I guess that doesn't sell more widgets though, does it....?! Actually I think that flawed marketing driven approach actually does the users a disservice.

Parental Controls bug in Mountain Lion 10.8.2