Do you need to protect YOURSELF from online pornography and Gambling?  This is an embarrassing question. But sadly, one more and more adults today need to ask themselves. That’s the “bad” the Internet has brought along with all its good. The instant and free access we all have to so much problem content.

If you once had to drive a several miles to the bad part of town to rent some xxx movies, today, it’s literally as easy as a click of the mouse in the middle of your work day. And Internet gambling? Think of how many people would have never ventured inside a casino but may try their luck on a bingo, poker or other gambling site offering a $50 coupon just for trying them out. It’s not that the casino sites are generous. They base it all on statistics. Give away a certain number of those $50 promotions and a certain percentage of the takers are going to get hooked  . . .

So if you are addicted to online porn or can’t stop gambling online, at least you should know – -you are not alone. Now, it’s time to do something about it. The question is what? After all, it’s no longer realistic to avoid computers, smartphones and Internet access overall. You may need the Internet for school, for work, to do your banking, make doctor’s appointment . . . It’s a part of life today as much as driving a car. So how can you stay away from online sex and gambling when it’s right there in front of you?

Truth be told, it won’t be easy.  And don’t fool yourself. It’s not about whether you are a strong enough person to resist. Once you have developed a compulsive tendency, going cold turkey usually backfires and can even make an addiction worse.

At Optenet, we discovered that many adults were buying parental controls to install on their own computers. But then those adults realized that if they installed the web filter software themselves, they would know the password and every time they felt tempted, they could simply use the password to turn the filter off. That made the web filter useless for truly blocking porn, gambling and other content adults have trouble with (shopping, Facebook and general Internet overuse).

Alternately, we started suggesting that adults who need to block specific  Internet sites and content should choose a trusted sponsor to set up the web filter for them and guard the password. We still think this is ideal. But let’s be realistic. Not everyone has someone that they feel comfortable to let in on what is probably a well kept secret — porn use and gambling. Most people seem to prefer to try to manage it themselves without involving others. This is perfectly understandable.

So we developed a new service for safeguarding your web filter password. You use our random password generator to choose your password. Watch our video on how to set and forget the password  for detailed instructions. Then we instruct you on how to set up the web filter and designate  our professional staff  as your accountability partner.

If you think you could benefit from using a web filter to block pornography, filter gambling sites, keep off of shopping sites or just general better control of your Internet use, contact us and let us know you need help. We’ll be hapy to include you in our accountability program!

He forgets to turn his computer off and you can’t resist a peek. But what you find, may change your relationship forever. So be prepared. More women are taken by surprise than you can imagine. Here are the five things you never want to find on your husband’s computer:

1. Personal Email from women you don’t know.
Let’s be straight here. If he is corresponding with someone by email and it’s not for work and you don’t know the person, it immediately becomes suspect. If it is a woman, you can’t tell me that this is not going to (understandably) get you wondering why he is in touch with a strange woman by email. It’s going to be very tempting to look at the contents, but maybe you want to try to talk about it first before such an invasion of privacy.
2. Visits to Gambling sites and evidence he’s been spending money.
If you look at his browser history, depending on how it is set, you can see the sites he has recently visited. Many people gamble online and keep it completely secret. If he’s been on gambling sites and you have some credit card charges you can’t identify, put 2 and 2 together. He’s been gambling and if he is not telling you, he may have an online gambling problem.

3. Visits to porn sites.
This is the first thing you thought of when you read the title of this article right? It’s every wife’s fear. He’s going to compare me to the women in those movies; he is going to want me to be like them, etc. But it is more than that. Sure, it is hurtful to know your husband looks at pornography. It makes you feel you are not enough. But if he spends a lot of time with porn and you notice some changes in his behavior, he may have a very serious porn addiction problem. You’ve got to bring this out in the open no matter how embarrassing or upsetting it is. Don’t buy the common excuse – “Every healthy man looks at porn”.

4. The Facebook account he never told you he had.
You believed him when he told you he is not interested in connecting with old friends on Facebook and never opened an account but suddenly you see it. His visits to Facebook, his hundreds of friends, wall posts from old girlfriends. And he kept you out of this circle. It’s only some innocent social networking, but he kept it secret and it’s going to drive you mad until you confront him.

5. A clean history in his browser.
Here is the one place you don’t necessarily want your husband to clean up after himself. Most people have no reason to clean their browsing history. Certainly not on a regular basis, unless they want to make sure they are hiding where they have been visiting online. So if you look, the cache is empty and you know he spends time browsing the Internet, now would be the time to start being worried about what he is doing there. Talk to him.

I frequently correspond with online gamblers seeking solutions to stop themselves from gambling. They face a difficult situation. They can’t totally eliminate the Internet from their life but the temptation to gamble online can be too hard to resist. Some people are not able to get professional help or if they do, are still faced with the difficulty of having easy access to gambling online wherever they have an Internet connection. It’s just too easy to gamble online whenever you are on the computer. Imagine a recovering alcoholic being forced to be around alcohol while he is just getting started working on recovery. It would make it much harder.

Some customers have reported trying out other software solutions before deciding to use Optenet PC as their gambling filter. I wanted to share the feedback they have offered and to share some of my own insights. It seems like products dedicated solely to filtering gambling sites are using a questionable method of protecting their software from workarounds – -they refuse, under any circumstances, to allow the user to uninstall the software. While I can understand why they do this, as a technology professional, I am concerned about the risk of installing any software that can not be uninstalled. Consider how complicated computers are and the potential problems. Imagine if Bill Gates had a no uninstall policy for Windows! I think such a policy takes advantage of the desperation of the user:

1. I am not going to install one of these other gambling blockers because I know I can’t uninstall it. But I am wondering how clear that is to the users who do install. Do some people install without knowing what they are committing to?
2. Some may think it is a good way to prevent any possible workarounds. First of all, we hear from some of our users that they managed to find a workaround to those other programs. That is not surprising since nothing can truly be 100% full proof. But I think it may be a lazy solution to avoid needing to handle password protection.
3. Those solutions may be most appealing to the gambler who wants to keep his problem quiet and try to solve it on his own. With a gambling block that can not be uninstalled, the gambler does not need to enlist the help of a sponsor or acquaintance. But we actually think it is important to involve a sponsor, even if this causes some initial discomfort for the gambling addict.
4. There are always going to be potential good reasons to uninstall — not satisfied with product, need to move the license to a new computer, need to sell the computer, decision to use another product, software conflict with other applications requires removal . . . If you have a sponsor with the password, that person is capable of deciding if the reason is valid and can reinstall when the time is right.

On one of the sites I reviewed for a Gambling blocker, I could not find a way to contact the company – not by phone and not by email. That really concerned me. I also searched for how to uninstall these programs and found many frustrated users posting on forums. Granted, some are frustrated because they want to gamble and can not but most seemed to have run into genuine problems with no technical support to assist them.
Bottom line — in theory, it may seem like a good idea to help a compulsive gambler by placing a gambling lock on their computer that can absolutely not be removed. But in reality, software has bugs, no one can predict possible problems in a given installation and no matter what the condition of a customer, if they don’t want to use a product, they need to have the right to uninstall. Preventing workarounds can be easily rectified by bringing a sponsor on to help the problem gambler and be responsible for the web filter.

Here is what online poker players are met with when they try to access one of the more popular poker sites on the Internet today, Pokerstars.com.
Online poker players may be in for a surprise as two of the more popular Internet poker websites have been  indicted for bank fraud and money laundering. The U.S. government has agreed to allow PokerStars and FullTiltPoker to resume use of domain names that had been shut down last week in order to be able to return money to customers. But as of today, the department of justice is still holding the sites captive.

When the sites are reactivated pokerstars.com and fulltiltpoker.com will only be allowed to “facilitate the withdrawal of U.S. players’ funds held in account with the companies.”The agreement also allows for non-US players  to resume playing for “real money” on the two Websites. But the damage done could be significant. Players who played poker on these sites regularly would have already seen the US Dept. of Justice warnings and likely been scared off. Many have likely taken their business elsewhere. Prosecutors said the same agreement is open to Absolute Poker, the third company indicted last week, if it chooses to accept.

The government alleges that the companies, based offshore, used a network of payment processors to set up fraudulent U.S. bank accounts to launder money from online poker players in the United States.

These latest developments can severely cripple the online gambling industry and probably means there is more to come. These are the most serious moves the US Dept. of Justice has taken since  2006, when Congress made it illegal for American banks to do business with gambling websites. Many closed down as a result of the new laws, but others were too tempted by the steep profits and decided to take a chance by finding a variety of loopholes that allowed them to continue operating in a grey legal area.

The sites that were in the US, relocated outside U.S. borders and continued to run their business. But in order to continue to process payments from US players, they had to lie to the banks about the nature of their business — and this is pure fraud.  Let’s see if we are on the way to helping dampen the 24/7 availability of gambling.

How to stop gambling online

Gambling on the Internet is as easy as playing a video game. A Google search, a click and you are there. It is easy for anyone to start gambling on the internet. No real proof of age is required and all you need is access to a credit card. So it is no surprise that the Internet has inspired a tremendous increase in gambling and in turn, in problem gamblers.
Online casinos, bingo, poker, sports betting, etc. are all available from anywhere at anytime, and it is easy to look get started with gambling without anyone knowing – at school, at home, at work, anywhere. Continue Reading

If a bar or liquor store were to fraudulently market themselves to alcoholics, what would you think? Imagine that an alcoholic, seeking help, notices an ad in the paper for a rehab. “Alcoholics Anonymous Center – Problem Drinkers Welcome”. He arrives to the “Center”, and finds himself at a buy 1 get 1 free beer night . He suddenly forgets his intent to quit and goes in to drink.

This is essentially what many gambling and betting web sites are doing today. They load their sites up with articles and content about compulsive gambling and how to quit gambling online. They are not embarrassed to give tips and advice about giving up gambling, while on the very same site – and even same page, they are promoting their gambling site. Continue Reading

The risks of compulsive gambling are many – losing money, losing friends, losing a job and even losing your family. Google tells the story in a 30 second video – and gives the solution to stop gambling online. Watch the video now!

There is a lot of information offered online about treatment to stop gambling, advice for gamblers that want to quit, gamblers anonymous , stop gambling forums, etc. Ironically,you will find many articles that offer advice to people who want to quit gambling on actual gambling and betting websites.

Unfortunately, this is nothing more than a cynical use of Internet marketing techniques to attract relevant traffic to gambling sites. The casinos know that if someone is addicted to gambling and he lands on their website, he is more likely to gamble on their site than other visitors. Further, when someone is looking for a solution to their gambling problem, they are weak and vulnerable. They are seeking help because they are desperate, but at the same time, all it might take for them to start gambling at that moment is a trigger – like landing on a site where they can gamble.

Don’t be fooled. It’s not that the gambling sites are interested in helping problem gamblers that end up there. It’s precisely the opposite – they are looking to attract people at their most vulnerable moment.  Here is how it works:

Continue Reading

There are many kinds of easily accessible online gambling sites and activities. Easy access to gambling is a potential disaster for a person with a compulsive gambling disorder or an inclination to having a problem with gambling. With an abundance of online casinos and betting sites, anyone with a gambling problem and an Internet connection is faced with temptation twenty-four hours a day.

Is compulsive gambling a real problem? Why can’t they just stop? Continue Reading

Internet betting and gambling sites are a multi-billion dollar industry that will not be going away anytime soon. But why all the concern? Well, researchers believe that Internet gambling is even more addictive than traditional casino gambling. Continue Reading