IamBigBrother is a product developed by InternetSafetySoftware.com. The company produces a variety of monitoring software solutions. IamBigBrother can assist the employer with the preservation of their profit margins. Parents can use the app to monitor their children's internet activity.
Internet connectivity presents many challenges for both employers and parents. Social networking sites, personal email exchanges and web surfing can cause an employee's productivity to dwindle, thus decreasing revenue. Children contend with threats from internet predators, cyber-bullies and more.
The majority of antivirus, antispyware and anti-keylogger applications are capable of detecting and disabling IamBigBrother. Prior to installation, these applications will need exclusions set up to prevent them from blocking the monitoring software.
The installation of IamBigBrother is quick and performed with ease. Uninstalling the PC monitoring software is tricky and difficult to perform. Even after successful removal, a non-functional remnant of the app could still be loaded into the operating system.
The User Interface is cumbersome, dated in appearance and confusing to navigate. Locating the recorded information is challenging at best. The monitoring software has no user help button. This obvious omission serves as a barrier to viewing the collected data.
IamBigBrother effectively captures screenshots. However, the recording of these images causes a decrease in system performance. The monitoring software is intermittently successful at logging visited websites, both sides of a chat conversation and keystrokes. Evaluations completed by internet users confirm that the reliability of the monitoring software is sporadic. Further, the app has compatibility issues with a variety of other applications.
IamBigBrother monitors both sides of instant messaging and chat conversations. Popular supported applications include AOL instant messenger, MSN, ICQ and Yahoo.
The PC monitoring software is able to capture email sent and received through Microsoft Outlook. There is no support for alternate email clients such as Eudora, GroupWise, Lotus Notes and others. Support for web-based email like Gmail, Yahoo and Hotmail is another missing feature of the application. Perhaps, in future version releases, the manufacturer will include a more robust email monitoring component.
IamBigBrother captures search engine phrases as well as accessed websites. The website-access monitoring feature has no date or time stamp. No information is available regarding the duration of a website visit. Because this feature is not there, it is impossible to differentiate if a website visit was intentional or if the user stumbled upon it by accident.
IamBigBrother comes equipped with several customization settings. The computer administrator is able to identify keywords. The application flags any user activity that contains a designated keyword in a log file. Other areas of customization include the frequency of screenshots, scheduled monitoring, stealth and non-stealth settings.
IamBigBrother has some good features. However, many of its capabilities seem diluted. The app lacks the functionality of other available applications on the market. The software has no remote management capabilities. The majority of surveillance applications come equipped with some type of remote management feature. These missing features include the issuing of remote commands that enable or disable the app, shut down or restart the computer and more.
The application records keyboard strokes, accessed applications and a limited amount of user activity. The manufacturer claims that IamBigBrother is appropriate for business use. However, because of omitted features, the product may be inadequate and too simplistic for workplace monitoring. Absent capabilities are file logging, print logging, clipboard logging and the logging of portable devices. Also lacking is the ability to block the usage of specified applications and USB devices.
IamBigBrother is included in our review lineup because the software manufacturer offers both remote and local reporting abilities. For an additional cost, computer administrators can view reports from any internet-connected computer by accessing the manufacturer’s website and logging in. Additionally, the viewing of reports can occur by physically accessing the monitored PC. Other surveillance applications rarely offer this dual reporting feature.
IamBigBrother comes equipped with several customization settings. The computer administrator is able to identify keywords. The application flags any user activity that contains a designated keyword in a log file. Other areas of customization include the frequency of screenshots, scheduled monitoring, stealth and non-stealth settings.
The reporting features of IamBigBrother are tedious and difficult to navigate. Collected keylogger information is difficult to view because the software heaps the data into a single category instead of sorting it by applications used. The omission of a search feature further impedes the reporting process. When coupled with heavy computer usage, the reading of reports becomes a burdensome task.
IamBigBrother has limited success in recording a monitored computer's activity. More robust and effective monitoring software products are available at an equivalent cost.
