Everything you need to know about setting up and using Shel™ family protection
Shel™ is a family content protection platform that works across every screen your child uses — phones, tablets, TVs, and streaming devices.
Shel™ has three main protection layers:
Everything runs on-device — no audio or video is recorded or transmitted.
Creating a Shel™ account is free and takes about 2 minutes:
No credit card required for the free tier.
Shel™ works on:
Android: Search "Shel Family Protection" on Google Play → Install → Sign in with your Shel™ account → select your child's profile.
iPhone: Search "Shel Family Protection" on the App Store → Install → Sign in → select your child's profile.
After installation, follow the setup prompts to grant the necessary permissions for protection to work.
Shel™ requests the following permissions, each with a specific purpose:
All processing happens on-device. Nothing is transmitted without your explicit consent.
Partially. The bleep engine and app blocking work offline since they run on-device. DNS protection (Home Shield) requires an internet connection to reach Shel™'s servers. Val monitoring requires internet to analyze and report.
If your child is offline, the bleep engine continues protecting based on the last downloaded word list.
From the dashboard at shel.app/dashboard:
You can always customize the settings for each child individually.
Yes. Each child has a Bleep Sensitivity setting:
Change this in Dashboard → Profiles → [Child's name] → Protection Settings → Bleep Sensitivity
A parent PIN prevents your child from accessing the parent profile on shared devices (like the TV). Without the PIN, children cannot switch to the parent profile or change settings.
Set your PIN in Dashboard → Settings → Account → Parent PIN. Use a 4-digit PIN you'll remember but your child won't guess.
The bleep engine listens to audio playing on your device and mutes it the instant it detects profanity — typically within 50 milliseconds, before you hear the word.
On phones and tablets, it uses the device microphone to capture audio from any app. On Google TV and Android TV devices, it captures the device's audio output directly.
All processing happens on-device. No audio is ever recorded, stored, or transmitted.
A few reasons this can happen:
Partially — it depends on how your child is listening:
TV Speakers (protected): Place a Google TV Streamer on the same TV as the console. Shel™ captures all audio from every HDMI input, including game audio. Real-time bleeping works automatically on TV speakers.
Headphones (not protected): When a child uses headphones plugged into a PS5 controller, Xbox controller, or a Bluetooth headset, the audio bypasses the TV entirely and goes directly to the headphones. No app — including Shel™ — can intercept this audio. This is a hardware limitation of how consoles route audio, not a Shel™ limitation.
For headphone gaming, Shel™ provides:
Even with headphones, several protection layers are active:
What cannot be protected with headphones: the audio content of the game itself, and real-time voice chat through console headsets (PS5, Xbox, Switch). This is a console hardware limitation — no parental control app can intercept encrypted console audio streams.
On Android:
On Google TV / Android TV:
Home Shield is Shel™'s DNS-based network protection. It works by changing your router's DNS settings to use Shel™'s family-safe servers, which block requests to inappropriate websites before they load.
You don't need it for Shel™ to work — the bleep engine, Val monitoring, and app blocking all work without it. Home Shield adds an extra layer that protects devices that can't install apps, like game consoles and smart TVs.
In your dashboard, go to Home → Home Shield → Set Up. You'll see your unique DNS addresses:
Then log into your router's admin page (usually 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1) and enter these DNS addresses in the DNS settings. The exact steps vary by router brand — your dashboard has guides for popular routers.
For Eero users: Eero connects automatically through the dashboard.
No. DNS filtering adds less than 1 millisecond to page load times in most cases. You won't notice any difference in internet speed.
Go to Dashboard → Settings → Custom DNS Rules → Add Allow Rule and enter the domain you want to allow. Changes take effect within a few minutes.
You can also report false positives to our team at dns@shel.app and we'll review within 24 hours.
Home Shield (router DNS) only covers devices on your home WiFi. When your child is on mobile data, Home Shield doesn't apply.
The Shel™ app on their phone uses a local VPN to enforce DNS protection even on mobile data — this covers them anywhere. Make sure the Shel™ app is installed and a profile is active on their phone.
On Fire TV, Shel™ enforces child profiles and DNS protection. Real-time audio bleeping requires a Google TV Streamer or NVIDIA Shield.
The Google TV Streamer is a streaming device made by Google that runs Android. Unlike Fire TV, it allows Shel™ to capture the TV's audio output directly, enabling real-time profanity bleeping for any content — including unknown shows, live TV, and game audio.
You don't need one for Shel™ to work, but it provides the most complete TV protection. Available for $100 at the Google Store.
This is intentional. Shel™ clears the active profile on every boot so that whoever is watching must identify themselves. This prevents a child from watching under a parent's profile to bypass content protection.
If you find this inconvenient, you can adjust the session timeout in Dashboard → Settings → TV Settings.
On Amazon Fire TV, Shel™ can block apps per child profile — for example, preventing younger children from opening certain apps. This is managed through DNS blocking of those app's network endpoints.
On Google TV Streamer and Android TV devices, app blocking uses the Accessibility Service and is managed through the child's profile settings in the dashboard.
Val™ is Shel™'s AI safety monitor. Val listens for signs that your child may be in danger, being bullied, or being contacted by someone who may mean them harm.
Val monitors two channels:
Val never shares conversation content with parents — only alert categories (e.g., "possible bullying detected"). Your child's privacy is respected while keeping them safe.
Legally, as a parent on a device you own, you are not required to disclose monitoring to a minor child. However, we recommend transparency — children who know about monitoring tend to make better choices and feel safer knowing someone is watching out for them.
Shel™ is designed for parental supervision of minor children on parent-owned devices, which is the same legal basis as Apple Screen Time and Google Family Link.
Val alerts are a signal to start a conversation with your child, not a cause for immediate alarm. When you receive an alert:
Val uses patterns to detect concerns — occasional alerts may be false positives. Use your judgment as a parent.
Yes. Go to Dashboard → Profiles → [Child's name] → Protection → Val Monitoring and toggle it off. You can also enable Teen Privacy mode which limits Val to serious safety concerns only (potential predatory contact, immediate danger signals) while respecting normal teen conversations.
Go to Dashboard → Settings → Co-parent Access → Send Invite. Enter their email address and choose their permission level:
They'll receive an email with a link to accept. Requires Shel Family or Shel Everywhere plan.
No. Core child profile settings are protected by the primary parent and cannot be changed by a co-parent regardless of their permission level. These protected settings include:
A co-parent with Manager access can only manage their own home location's devices and network settings.
Shel Everywhere ($24.99/mo) supports up to 3 separate locations, each with their own DNS endpoint. Setup:
Child profiles and settings sync across all locations automatically.
Yes — two options:
Annual plans save up to 27% vs monthly. Manage your plan at shel.app/dashboard.
Go to shel.app/dashboard → Settings → Billing. Changes take effect immediately. When upgrading, you're charged the prorated difference for the remaining billing period.
Yes. Cancel anytime from Dashboard → Settings → Billing → Cancel Plan. You'll retain access until the end of your current billing period. No cancellation fees.
Yes. Shel™ uses Stripe for payment processing — the same payment system used by millions of businesses worldwide. Shel™ never stores your card number. All payment data is encrypted and handled by Stripe directly.
No. All Shel™ subscriptions are managed at shel.app/dashboard directly. You pay through our secure web checkout — no app store fees, which means more of your money goes toward protecting your family.
No. The bleep engine and Val voice monitor analyze audio in real time on the device and immediately discard it. No audio is ever recorded, stored, or transmitted.
Val message monitoring analyzes text for patterns but does not store the content of messages. Only the detection category (e.g., "possible bullying") is logged, never the actual conversation.
Shel™ collects:
Shel™ does NOT collect:
See our full Privacy Policy for details.
Yes. Shel™ is designed for parents to protect minor children and fully complies with COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act). Child accounts are created and managed by parents. No data from child accounts is sold or shared with third parties.
Go to Dashboard → Settings → Account → Delete Account. This permanently deletes your account, all child profiles, and all associated data within 30 days per our data retention policy. This action cannot be undone.
You can also email privacy@shel.app to request data deletion.
Shel™ is honest about what it can and cannot protect. Here is a complete breakdown:
✅ PROTECTED — Shel™ can bleep these:
❌ NOT PROTECTED — No app can intercept these:
💡 Tip: The most effective household rule that pairs with Shel™: "TV speakers only during gaming sessions." This gives Shel™ full access to all game audio and eliminates the headphone limitation entirely.
✅ PROTECTED:
❌ NOT PROTECTED:
✅ MONITORED by Val™:
❌ NOT MONITORED:
Val™ monitoring requires parental consent and is configured per child profile. Teen privacy settings limit monitoring to serious safety signals only.
Yes. Shel™ technology is protected by five U.S. Provisional Patent Applications filed August 5, 2026:
All inventions are filed under Infinite Nature Group, Inc. with Tara Shelander as first named inventor.
Or say "Shel" to the Alexa voice remote to find and launch the app.
Shel™ is designed to restart automatically after a phone reboot via our Boot Receiver. If protection isn't running after a restart:
Activity appears in the dashboard when protection events occur. If you're not seeing activity:
We're here to help:
Our team is here to help you get Shel™ set up and protecting your family.
Contact Support →