How to Set Up Parental Controls on a Sony Smart TV

Authored by: Support.com Tech Pro Team

1. Introduction

In This Guide

You'll Learn:

• What parental control options are available on your Smart TV.
• The limitations of your Smart TV's parental control options.
• About different TV & Film ratings that can be used to restrict viewing options.
• How to implement parental restrictions on your Smart TV.

2. Parental Controls

Parental Controls are features available on Sony Smart TVs, that help parents reduce the risk of their children encountering unwanted or inappropriate content for their age or maturity level while watching TV or using internet apps.

Using Parental Controls is only an extra step in helping parents protect their children. Active, engaged parenting is essential in helping children develop good habits. Working with the children, talking to them and encouraging responsible behaviour is critical.

Smart TVs have become a point of convergence for all media and content sources, which allow us to enjoy all the entertainment from a single place. When it comes to configuring Parental Controls, it is important to understand the strengths and limitations that Sony Smart TV features provide:

• They provide Parental Controls for traditional live TV channels, such as antenna or cable, and internet apps, such as browsers or streaming services. Certain apps may provide their own additional Parental Controls that can vary from one app to another and must be configured separately.
• They do not provide Parental Controls for other external sources such as: cable boxes, satellite receivers, gaming consoles, DVD, Blu-ray and other media players. If any of those devices provide such features, they will vary from one device to another and must be configured separately.

Sony Smart TV's run on the Android TV platform which is being updated periodically. The home screen layout and options may look slightly different depending on the Android TV version your Sony Smart TV is running. However, the steps should be similar across all Android TV versions.

3. TV Ratings

The TV Parental Guidelines Monitoring Board created the TV Ratings, or the TV Parental Guidelines, to help parents determine if a program is suitable for their child to watch by outlining the show’s target audience and possible content.

The TV Parental Guidelines Monitoring Board is a single group, and only provides opinions on content. They are there to help give you an overview of the themes present in a television program, not make decisions what is best for your child.

These ratings along with content descriptors appear in the top left corner of the TV screen during the first 15 seconds of each TV program and, on some TV channels, after every commercial break.

Rating Level

All Children

Intended for children ages 2 to 6 and is not designed or expected to frighten.

Older Children

Intended for children ages 7 and older. Best suited for children who know the difference between real life and make-believe. Contains mild fantasy or comedic violence. Some content could frighten younger children (under age 7).

General Audience

Intended for all ages. Contains little or no violence, no strong language and little or no sexual dialogue or situations.

Parental Guidance

Intended for younger children in the company of an adult. Possibly contains some suggestive dialogue, infrequent coarse language, some sexual situations or some moderate violence.

Parental Caution

Intended for children ages 14 and older in the company of an adult. Possibly contains intensely suggestive dialogue, strong coarse language, intense sexual situations or intense violence.

Mature Audience

Intended for adults and may be unsuitable for children under 17. Possibly contains crude indecent language, explicit sexual activity or graphic violence.

Content Descriptor

• FV - Fantasy Violence (exclusive to the TV-Y7 rating)
• D - Sexually Suggestive Dialogue (exclusive to the TV-PG and TV-14 ratings)
• L - Course or Crude Language
• S - Sexual Situations
• V - Violence

For further information, you can always check www.tvguidelines.org from any web browser.

4. MPAA Ratings

The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) created the Film Ratings to help parents determine if a film is suitable for their child to watch. Ratings are determined by the Classification and Ratings Administration (CARA), via a board comprised of an independent group of parents.

The MPAA is a single group, and only provides opinions on content. They are there to help give you an overview of the themes present in a television program, not make decisions what is best for your child.

These ratings appear on all advertising materials for films, such as posters, movie trailers or online ads, on home video titles, such as DVD and Blu-Ray covers, and are listed in theaters and online streaming services when films are released.

Rating Badge

A film rating badge shows the following information:

• Rating Level on the left - indicates the films level of content so parents can decide whether the movie is suitable for their children.
• Rating Definition at the bottom - provides a more detailed explanation to parents of what the specific rating means.
• Rating Descriptors on the right - this language is unique to each film to convey the elements that caused it to receive its rating.

Rating Level

General Audience

This program is designed to be appropriate for all ages. This rating indicates a film contains nothing that would offend parents for viewing by children.

Parental Guidance

Parents are urged to give parental guidance. This film may contain some material parents might not like for their young children.

Parental Caution

Some material may not be suited for children under age 13. May contain violence, nudity, sensuality, language, adult activities or other elements beyond a PG rating, but doesn’t reach the restricted R category.

Restricted Audience

This rating is for films specifically designed to be viewed by adults and therefore may be unsuitable for children under 17.

Adult Audience

This rating is applied to films the MPAA believes most parents will consider inappropriate for children 17 and under. It indicates that the adult content is more intense than in an R rated movie.

For further information, you can always check www.filmratings.com from any web browser.

5. Use Parental Lock

1. From the home screen go to Settings.
   

1. Under the Personal heading select Parental lock.
   

1. Set a new PIN or enter your current PIN.
   

1. 
   
2. The default PIN is 1234.
3. From here you'll be able to lock TV programs from traditional TV channels as well as streaming services based on their TV and Film Ratings.

6. Use Restricted Profile

1. From the home screen go to Settings.
   

1. Under the Personal heading select Security & restrictions.
   

1. Then go to Restricted profile.
   

1. And select Settings.
   

1. Set a new PIN or enter your current PIN.
   

1. The default PIN is 1234.
2. Scroll through the list of apps and select one you'd like to configure.
   

1. Select Allowed if you'd like the app to show up on the home screen or Not allowed if you'd like to hide the app from the home screen.
   

1. Go back to the previous screen and select Enter restricted profile.
   

1. The home screen will only show the apps that are allowed for the restricted profile.
   

7. Restrict Store Content

1. Select the Google Play Store app from the home screen.
   

1. Go to Settings.
   

1. Then select Content filtering.
   

1. Choose the highest maturity level that apps can have to show up in the Google Play Store.
   

1. Set a new PIN or enter your current PIN.
   

1. The default PIN is 1234.
2. After that select Purchase authorization.
   

1. Select how often authentication should be required when purchasing apps from the Google Play Store.
   

Besides filtering store content based on maturity level and and requiring authentication for app purchases, some apps may provide additional features within their settings to restrict, filter or block unwanted or inappropriate content.