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Issue link: https://digital.macdirectory.com/i/1464866
A Guarded Garden Next up is where the Gryphon AX really comes into its own and the company’s comprehensive approach to design really shines. (Either that or they have kids of their own.) There is, as you’d expect, comprehensive screen time management, allowing you to set a maximum number of hours each day of the week. What’s more, you can add “Reward Time,” additional hours on a certain day. Access control can be set for certain categories of apps like Arts & Entertainment, email, chat, mature content and online shopping. These can be set to Unrestricted, Blocked during Homework, or Always Blocked. The same is true for apps. Unfortunately, this is based on a preset list that may not reflect what all kids have on their phone. You can also blacklist individual URLs. Don’t worry about your bright middle-schoolers who has learned all about proxies and VPNs from their classmates. The router will recognize and report the presence of a VPN. We discovered that it sniffed-out our service even when it wasn’t active. Watch Where You Go The Connect app keeps detailed logs of all internet activities and provides extensive reporting. This includes statistics about time spent on different categories of sites and apps and data usage. It can also remotely view a full browsing history of the device. This data has end-to-end encryption to keep it the information in the family. Though all the device settings are managed by the app, going to the router’s IP in a web browser will display the access schedule for the family member and even allow them to request access to a certain URL that was set up to be blocked. A notification will pop up on your device when the request is made. The Connect app also includes an array of traditional router settings for the more technical user. This is not as robust as some other quality home-office routers, but all the basics are there. These, by the way, are pretty much all configured for you as you’re walked through the device setup, so if terms like “Dynamic DNS” and “IGMP Snooping” are not your thing, you’ll likely never have to encounter them. One annoyance with the app is that when it starts up, it puts up a screen asking you to subscribe to Gryphon Premium, an add-on security service that monitors potentially malicious websites, potential vulnerabilities that would allow your network to be penetrated, and other similar features. After a trial period. This costs $7.99/month or $89.99 per year. We couldn’t find any way to turn off this gentle reminder.