After much development and planning, Securly is proud to announce Securly 24 which…

Hold on, is this a rip-off of the TV show “24” starring Kiefer Sutherland that took viewers on time-sensitive adventures in a post-9/11 world for an impressive 8 seasons on Fox?

What? No, that’s not even close. We’re excited about Securly 24 because it brings back the one factor missing from technology-based solutions: the human factor. Securly 24 is important because there are times when urgency or context can be difficult for technology to determine, even an advanced artificial intelligence like ours. However, these determinations are absolutely necessary to distinguish active from passive warning signs. With Securly 24, trained professionals can discern what tech cannot.

Wait a sec, so Securly hired trained professional Kiefer Sutherland to work a 24-hour shift alongside a robot sidekick? Bro, that sounds awesome!

While we appreciate Mr. Sutherland and his body of work, he has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on Securly 24. The only thing that matters, and truly the primary motivation for rolling out 24, is making sure kids are safe…at all times.

Securly already monitors for such things as cyberbullying and self-harm across Filter and Auditor and administrators receive email alerts when such things are found. However, an email alert may not be seen until the next day. In some cases, that is already too late.

“The reality is that troublesome activities do happen, but not always between the hours of 9am and 5pm. Securly wants to minimize any chance of oversight by adding trained humans back into the equation,” says co-founder/CEO Vinay Mahadik.

Filter 24 automatically observes a student’s activity on the web, social media, and Youtube, while Auditor 24 scans Google emails. When an activity is flagged, a trained staff member will review the context in which it was used and, if necessary, the user’s history for insight into the bigger picture. Able to recognize the nuances of language and critically analyze a user’s history, a human can make determinations that technology may overlook. If flagged activities are cause for alarm, a Securly 24 staff member will alert a counselor in real-time via text or, if necessary, a phone call.

Sometimes the feeling of pain and isolation can be overwhelming at, say, 2AM on a Sunday. Fortunately, Securly is making sure that even when the rest of the world is asleep, the right folks are keeping an eye on the most vulnerable among us. Sometimes we just need a hero who is at the right place at the right time.

Hey, kinda like…

Yes, exactly like Kiefer Sutherland.

Interested? Join our priority list now! Click here.

September means Back to School! There’s excitement in the air as families rush to the Target aisles to buy notebooks, pens, and materials for a promising year full of new experiences. As exciting as Back to School can be, kids can feel scared and overwhelmed. For many, it can feel too overwhelming. September also happens to be National Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, an occasion to spotlight an issue that is growing among youths, and one that shows no signs of slowing down.

Youth suicide is a major cause of death during the crucial years when they should be building healthy interactions with their peers, constructing positive self-images, and forming important social bonds. According to 2015 statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide is the third leading cause of death in children aged 10-14.

Many suicides occur in isolation, while others are clustered in back-to-back succession around the same school or district. Many school authorities and administrations are baffled as to what is causing their students to kill themselves with alarming frequency. Could it be an increasingly rigorous academic schedule? Is it from bullying and social pressure to be attractive, cool, liked?

There are many reasons why this could be happening. Social pressure and lack of support can be contributors, as well as anxiety, depression, PTSD, panic disorders, and other psychological disorders which can impact suicidal intent. Kids struggling with anxiety disorders are more likely than mentally healthy people to have suicidal thoughts, make suicide attempts, or complete suicide. When it comes to depression, according to researchers, a specific occurrence of hopelessness in depressed people, rather than the depression as a whole, is a stronger indicator of suicidal feelings. That means that a depressed child will not necessarily be suicidal, but that a child feeling hopeless during their depression will be more likely to want to kill themselves.

That being said, it is important to remember that not every child who is suicidal has a mental disorder, and not every person with a mental disorder is suicidal. Many factors contribute to why a kid may feel that way, and it’s important to pay attention to warning signs when they do. Kids who want to harm themselves or die typically will leave a number of clues that indicate their suicidal ideation or intention.

In our next blog post covering suicide, we’ll explore the warning signs that parents and teachers can look out for, and how to help your child when you find them.

If you or a loved one is struggling with suicidal thoughts, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or text HOME to 741-741 to get connected with Crisis Text Line.

You might think that auto scaling is the practice of meticulously painting, say, your Toyota Prius to look like an Atlantic salmon. It’s hard to believe, but…you would be wrong. Auto scaling refers to servers turning on or sleeping based on the amount of traffic at a given time. The new school year means increased traffic, which means you’d better be prepared.

Earlier scaling attempts were on par with early attempts at flight, a lot of trial and error. If it did work, it didn’t mitigate the chances of a server getting maxed out or even crashing. Cloud-based auto scaling solves a lot of these issues. To roll out cloud-based auto scaling, our engineers have enduring sleepless nights, fewer showers, and lots of caffeine. Now, it’s up and running.

As traffic fluctuates, servers turn on or go to sleep based on use. To help the servers get to sleep, they are read an excerpt from 50 Shades of Grey. Knocks ‘em right out.

Advantages of cloud-based auto scaling

• Better fault tolerance: Auto scaling detects when an unhealthy instance, terminates it, and launches a replacement.
• Improved availability: This ensures that our servers always have the capacity to handle the current traffic demands.
• Blazing fast DNS resolution.
• Automated load handling.
• Highly scalable.
• Higher service uptime.

What started as an overly complex game of tic-tac-toe between Siddhartha Desai, DevOps Engineer and Pei Deng, DevOps Manager became the genesis for our cloud-based auto scaling. Also, Sid won three games straight.

Securly’s goal is simple. Our engineers are taking care of the auto scaling so that admins don’t have to. Before a big day like Back to School, we would rather let them sleep.

Despite industry norm, Securly believes that basic online safety for kids should be free. Securly isn’t the oldest company in EdTech, but we are among the fastest growing. To back up that claim, let’s do the math. Number of school districts who are paying customers: over 1000; Districts using the free Chrome Extension and Auditor: 600; Cost of our extension and Auditor: $0. Those are good numbers. From a business standpoint, we’re happy. From an altruistic standpoint, we’re ecstatic.

The 600 school districts (and counting) that have rolled out Securly Free have noticed a few things. First, because it categorizes dangerous websites (e.g. porn, gambling, drugs), students are thriving with a more age-appropriate Internet. Second, because Securly is cloud-based, school districts are benefitting from a minimal network footprint. Win-win? Yup-yup!

Auditor is the name of our tech that uses artificial intelligence to scan Gmail for signs of cyberbullying or even self-harm. It’s as cool as it sounds. When we hear directly about a life that was changed for the better or a life that was saved because of what we do, it means more than anything. Like, more than a good WiFi signal? Definitely.

More than a free Tesla? Oh yeah.

More than the power of invisibility? Totally.

More than ice cream? Well, now you’re just being blasphemous.

Districts signing up for Securly Premium are thrilled with the expansion to non-Chromebook devices (tablets, Macs, PCs, etc.), Parental Integration, Delegated Admin, and Dedicated Student Safety Coordinators.

“I wanted to quickly write you and thank everyone at Securly for their hard work. I like to think this is Securly pilot semester and your services have been recommended by others I network with in education. I look forward to using this tool as a part of our student monitoring. Thank you, again, and make sure to thank the entire Securly team.”

Collin Miller

Taos Academy Charter School

“Just an update. It’s working amazingly and already alerted us to one potential self-harm/suicide situation so we can intervene. We’re quite pleased! Thanks for everything.”

David Wolford

Securly shook up the industry by offering basic safety for kids for free, forever. Schools and parents (and kids) have benefitted from this in so many ways that we’re confident in our decision to release the free Chrome Extension. Free or Premium, Securly keeps kids safe and gives adults peace of mind. Free or Premium, schools and parents can’t go wrong.

For more information please watch this video.

Get Safer Students Now! 

In March this year,  we launched Auditor our free tool that detects signs of bullying and self-harm on Gmail. Securly was founded with a double-bottom line mission to keep kids safe online while continuing to be a sustainable business. Humbled by the overwhelming response to Auditor, we have now opened up our Chromebook filtering service for FREE for everyone – within the US and outside. 

You can sign up and install the Chrome extension here. Our Chromebook solution is easy to install (10 mins – no kidding!). It protects kids from inappropriate and malicious content, follows them home, and even keeps parents in the loop. 

And just because our Chromebook service is free does not mean that we leave you to figure it out for yourself. If you need help, you can sign up to our daily UI walkthrough webinars with one of our engineers to help you understand the features and answer any questions you may have. Or you can connect with our current users and support team over the dedicated Google+ forum.