A GLASGOW company is to play a key role in protecting children when they surf the internet.

Iomart has secured a contract with English internet firm Censorit for its new venture.

Iomart, based at the West of Scotland Science Park, near Maryhill, will be responsible for a new service to ensure children surf safely when using gaming consoles.

A new generation of machines - such as the Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii and PlayStation 3 - have made it harder for parents to police what kids can access online due to their wi-fi capability.

And unlike family computers, they are more likely to be in the child's bedroom rather than in a place where parents can see what sites they are logging on to.

Censorit's new system provides a proxy service', which sits in-between the wi-fi unit the console is connected to and the internet.

It acts as a gateway that filters inappropriate content from being displayed on the device.

Acting like a big brother, it means certain website addresses cannot be accessed, either those deemed inappropriate by Censorit or a parent, and also monitors what children are attempting to search for, checking for the use of profanities or certain words and phrases.

Iomart will be the webhosts for the new service, responsible for making sure Censorit is always active 24 hours a day - something that's important if it is to protect children across the globe.

And Iomart's role is made even more important by the fact any glitch in service which resulted in a failure of the censor filters could lead to children accessing inappropriate content.

Iomart managing director Sarah Haran said: "We are delighted to have been chosen by Censorit as its hosting partner for this innovative child safety solution.

"We have more than 10 years' experience in delivering large-scale, always on' services, so we understand just how critical zero downtime is to a product such as Censorit's."

Dan Makin, founder of Censorit, said: "The backbone of our company basically relies on Iomart - if the servers go down the entire solution is offline and that simply cannot happen."