Purity - Porn Block Browser 17+

I have long said “If only there was a text-only browser for mobile!” Well, here it is. It gives you a black- and white-list option, as well as the option to add the email of an accountability partner, and a 4-digit pin to lock the settings. It does not take screenshots of your phone, but analyzes the text of your search words and of the web pages for risky/dangerous behavior.

And it works. Sometimes a little too well- for example, it will block some Intuit pages because they include the phrase “yandex”. But by and large I can get done what I need done. Thankful to these folks for enabling me to have access to the internet for research and work, without the temptation of porn, or even of reading sensual stories.

To Purity - thank you. Please don’t cave to the inevitable pressure of users who say “this would be perfect, if only we could also do X, Y, or Z”. The world needs a barebones text-based browser just like Purity is now. I get that some changes might be good, but you have a simple app that works. More complexity lends itself to more bugs and issues.

To other users - this app works really well in tandem with the Screen Time restrictions on iPhones, if you want to really dial in safety on your phone. Set your safety settings in Purity and Screen Time, then have a trusted friend/accountability partner set the 4-digit pins for both Purity and Screen Time.

3 cheers to helping make the internet a safer place.

This app is great for resisting temptation, it will block URLs that you blacklist and any specific words you want blacklisted in URLs. It is in Google Safe Search by default and is great for blocking very specific sites or searches in specific sites. This is great and has been very helpful.

The positives sadly stop there. This browser is slow and very clunky, taking a considerable amount of time to load web pages even on a newer phone with great connection. The main issue though, is that if you have a specific URL blacklisted, it will block that URL even if it is a back link somewhere on the page. For example, if I have Twitter blocked, it will load a web page until it realizes there is a link for a company’s Twitter account somewhere on the page, then it will send an alert and stop loading the page. This app and its blocking algorithm does not take into account URLs that are linked to a web page, it just sees them and automatically blocks the page. You can imagine how frustrating it is to try and load a web page but it is blocked because the author has a link to their social media at the bottom of the page.

Although this app will help you fight temptation and that is the ultimate goal, it is slow, filled with errors like the example given above, and poorly optimized. I am actively looking for a replacement because of these issues.

This is the best app of its kind that I have tried (and I’ve used several). Every other filter has loopholes or blind spots of some kind, but Purity’s zero image option is as close to perfect as you can get. The gift of peace of mind is priceless. Thank you to the devs, this is a game changing app!
Couple suggestions though - figure out a way to load captchas and buttons? Can be a bit of an issue, especially since these often occur on important sites (finance, jobs, etc). Also, rather than just cutting out pictures, replace them with a stock frame or logo or something of same dimensions. This would solve major formatting problems that appear and maybe cut out unnecessary blocking of some sites that load external images.