Greg Writer had about as personal a lesson in the importance of Internet safety for children as you can get.

His daughter, at age 7, typed her own name into a search engine while sitting in the family living room near her parents. What came up wasn’t something any parent would want their child to see.

“Mommy, mommy, why are these girls showing off their naked butts?” Writer remembers his daughter asking confusedly.

“After this happened, I started looking for filters and products to project the kids,” Writer says. At this time they really were inadequate.”

Writer had the idea that instead of screening out Web sites that were potentially unsuitable for young kids, Internet software should exist that would only allow them to view Web sites that were pre-approved. So he contacted his brother, a computer programmer, and what would become the Children’s Educational Network, a family-friendly Internet software firm, was born.

The firm’s key product is Tuki, a Web browser that only allows kids to go to Web sites that are pre-approved by CEN, which prescreens Internet sites for content that could be dangerous or inappropriate.

Parents can add or delete sites from the banned list, and when a parent adds a new site to Tuki, CEN is notified and considers whether or not to add it to the general list of approved Web sites.

The firm currently has 8,000 Web sites approved for children — such favorites as Disney and Cartoon Network. Banned sites include some household names like Google and YouTube, which Writer said can be used by children to inadvertently access inappropriate content.

The browser can be downloaded for free from the company Web site: www.childrenseducationalnetwork.com.

But the true realization of Writer’s vision of the Internet for kids is a Web portal and social network called ClubTuki, which allows browsing, e-mail and other Internet activities in a way safe for children.

While the browser limits kids’ Web surfing only to sites vetted for safety, the ClubTuki e-mail program only allows them to email pre-approved friends and family. The portal also includes a YouTube-like TukiTV area that features TV shows safe for children.

The mantra of ClubTuki, Writer says, is education — teaching kids to learn to avoid dangers on the Internet while getting the most out of it in the safest way possible. ClubTuki includes an “educational arcade” where kids can play games that teach them how to be safe on the Internet. They earn “Tuki moola” through the games, which they can then spend at the “Tuki auction.”

The Web portal is designed to limit some of the most dangerous types of Internet crimes, Writer says: “phising” and other activities where criminals trick children into revealing personal information.

“Phising” is the term for e-mails that get respondents to give up personal passwords and other private information. But even email and instant messaging can become arenas for those with malevolent agendas to reach vulnerable children.

“The thought of a predator talking to my daughter in her family room just makes me scared,” Writer said.

He argues that technology isn’t enough to prevent children from running across things online that they shouldn’t see — only simultaneous education will do it. And that’s partly because other Web filters, such as those offered by Internet service providers, usually need to be set up. The Tuki browser, in contrast, comes with a “very conservative” screening policy installed by default.

“Parents really don’t know as much about the computers in a lot of cases as the kids do,” Writer says.

The best part for parents is that most of the CEN software, including the Web browser and much of Club Tuki, is available for free. Certain features of Club Tuki, such as the auction area, are only accessible with a premium membership, which costs $4.95 per month or $47 annually.

Writer is depending on getting 20 percent of CEN software users to sign up for the premium service. But the firm has also found another revenue stream: marketing “skins” for the browser that include favorite child characters like Shrek. CEN can create a custom child-safe browser for any theme or character; it charges $6.97 to download the Shrek browser.

Writer, a former investment banker, says the company has already seen 40,000 downloads of its standard browser. But that’s just a hint of where he hopes the company — and its vision of a child-safe Internet — will go.

“We’re making big history,” Writer says. “When your child gets to a porn site and you have to deal with that with a 7 year-old, you’re just going, ‘this is wrong.’”