'Blocked' devices still on wifi network

[Incantrix]

At night, I block my 12 yr old daughter's ipad (non 4G) and iPhone (no SIM) so she's not up all night on You Tube or TikTok etc. Imagine my surprise when I hear talking coming from her room at 3am. 

Despite blocking both devices and sites on the Vodafone Broadband app, she had downloaded, installed and was chatting on a social media app. Having a closer look confirmed that both devices were still connected to our network whilst showing as blocked.

I am furious that Vodafone claim that a user can block any device when, in reality, they can't. This is a serious and potentially dangerous situation and I was wondering if anyone else has encountered this

[Incantrix]

At night, I block my 12 yr old daughter's ipad (non 4G) and iPhone (no SIM) so she's not up all night on You Tube or TikTok etc. Imagine my surprise when I hear talking coming from her room at 3am. 

Despite blocking both devices and sites on the Vodafone Broadband app, she had downloaded, installed and was chatting on a social media app. Having a closer look confirmed that both devices were still connected to our network whilst showing as blocked.

I am furious that Vodafone claim that a user can block any device when, in reality, they can't. This is a serious and potentially dangerous situation and I was wondering if anyone else has encountered this

[Ripshod]

Modern devices have what they call a "security feature" that randomizes the device's mac address. Go into each device and disable this feature so when you block them it sticks.

Teenagers are IT wise though so the only way to prevent this happening again is to set yourself up as the devices' sole admin.

Another way to stop them changing it would be to assign a fixed IP address to every device that connects to the router and disable dhcp, which in the world of IoT is a lot of work. . 

Another (and probably the best in your situation) is to only give them access to a guest network or an access point and turn this on and off as needed. 

[Incantrix]

Thank you. The guest network idea sounds like the most workable option.

[donnyguy]

Hi there, 

As you mention your daughters devices are both Apple, you should look at the 'Screen time' feature which you can either control remotely from your devices (if you're apple too) or set up on your daughters device (you set up a 4 digit PIN that she'll never know in the process).

You can then arrange for all devices on her Apple ID to go off at certain times. Works perfectly.