Create Custom Trigger Words

Can I customize my Alert Sensitivity for a specific activity, word, or phrase?

Yes, you can!

Accountable2You maintains a massive (and always growing) list of questionable words and phrases that produce alerts - no action needed on your part. 

But let’s say you have a unique scenario where you’d like to customize your alerts. Good news! Your account features custom Alert Sensitivity settings where you can set specific words and phrases as questionable, highly questionable. You can also choose to reduce or ignore non-questionable words and phrases. If you'd like to increase (or decrease) the overall monitoring sensitivity for a specific device, check out this article.

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How to modify the Alert Sensitivity list

1. Click this link and sign-in: https://www.my.accountable2you.com/members/settings
2. In the Account Settings screen, click Alert Sensitivity.
3. Here you’ll add the text or phrase exactly as it’s formatted in the accountability report. The entries are not case-sensitive, but spaces and punctuation must match.
4. Then choose a rating adjustment, based off of your preference - the text below the rating adjustment field explains the differences between each option. It will take about an hour for the changes to update.

Family Plans and Organization Plans:

1. Click this link and sign-in: https://my.accountable2you.com/ManageUsers
2. Beside the row that contains the user you’d like to modify, click the Actions button and select Alert Sensitivity from the menu. 
3. Here you’ll add the text or phrase exactly as it’s formatted in the accountability report. The entries are not case-sensitive, but spaces and punctuation must match.
4. Then choose a rating adjustment, based on your preference - the text below the rating adjustment field explains the differences between each option. It will take about an hour for the changes to update.
5. Repeat steps 2-4 for any other users you’d like to modify.

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When should I add a questionable word to my Alert Sensitivity list?

This is a tough question because the answer varies based upon the specific needs of the situation. The general best practice is only to add words or phrases when you see questionable activity on the Accountability Report that did not produce an alert.

While it doesn’t answer every scenario, this workflow might provide a better example:

The word “_______” is clearly a bad word. I know a bunch of other bad words and objectionable phrases. I don’t want the user searching or looking at content that contains those words, so should I add it to the Alert Sensitivity list?

No - Accountable2You maintains a massive (and ever-increasing) list of questionable words and phrases. By manually adding words and phrases, you may create false positives on the Accountability Report.

The word "_______" doesn’t create an alert, but I can see on the Accountability Report that the user is browsing websites that contain the word “_______.” Should I add it to the Alert Sensitivity list?

           Yes - This is an excellent example of how to use the Alert Sensitivity list.

The word “_______” creates an alert on the report, but not always - or sometimes it’s only marked as “questionable” instead of “highly questionable.” Should I add it to the Alert Sensitivity list?

           Yes - This is an excellent example of how to use the Alert Sensitivity list.

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This one is a little easier to answer. If a specific activity is creating alerts unnecessarily, you can add a word or phrase from that recurring alert as 'Reduced' or 'Ignored' to prevent these false positives from appearing. Adding words to the Alert Sensitivity list will generate an alert to that user’s accountability partners to inform them of the changes. 

For example, let’s say that you use Mozilla Thunderbird as your email app on your computer. Every time you open the Mozilla Thunderbird application to read email, it creates an unnecessary alert to your accountability partners. In this case, you could add “Mozilla Thunderbird” to your Alert Sensitivity list as 'Ignored'. The words “Mozilla” and “Thunderbird” would still produce an alert (if they were questionable), but the exact phrase “Mozilla Thunderbird” would not create an alert. 

Note: Before creating the exclusion, it’s wise to consider if there’s a scenario where you would want this word or phrase to create an alert in the future.