Practical guides on Android focus, security and content filtering — from the team building SafeSurf & SafeGuard.
Apps open a hidden browser inside themselves to slip past your blocker. A VPN can block WebView traffic at the network level but can't modify what's inside — and it drains your battery, hogs the only VPN slot, and is one tap from being disabled. SafeGuard takes a different route: it detects the in-app browser and closes the app, with no VPN needed.
A filtering Private DNS blocks ads and unsafe sites across the whole device with no VPN and no latency. On its own anyone can switch it off — so SafeGuard uses Device Owner to lock the DNS setting, keeping the Private DNS you chose enforced.
A filter you can disable in two taps is not protection. Here is how Device Owner status uses official, built-in system APIs to stop a focus app being uninstalled, force-stopped, or bypassed.
Compulsive checking runs on a three-second loop that willpower cannot win. A delay mechanism inserts mandatory waiting time before any unblock takes effect — here is how and why it works.
SafeGuard offers two distinct ways to enforce your VPN — blocking VPN settings entirely, or locking a specific VPN app with built-in Always-On. Here is how it works, and why SafeSurf Browser does not need a VPN in the first place.