Site Filtering For Business

In just a few short years, computers and the Internet have revolutionized the way most industries operate. It’s hard to think of a business that doesn’t work more efficiently today than at any time in the past. 

However, along with countless benefits have come a few problems. One thorny issue which pops up with increasing regularity—particularly among small business owners—involves employee use of the Internet for personal business or pleasure. The major question seems to be: “How do you keep it from getting out of hand?”

Many employers don’t begrudge workers a small amount of personal surf time. Most know that a short break every now and then—whether a walk to the water cooler or a cyber-leap to the online bookstore—greatly improves job performance.

Also, statistics indicate that most employees don’t take undue advantage of Internet access. A recent study by Forrester Research revealed that less than 20% of employee online time is spent on personal matters (i.e., for every one hour online, 12 minutes are spent on sites unrelated to company business). Since few jobs involve being online all day long, the amount of employee time lost to the Web is small indeed.

But there are other problems involved with employees’ personal use of the Web. Serious, realistic concerns involve downloaded computer viruses, network security and legal issues. Among the complications that can develop:

·Employees downloading software to their hard disks can inadvertently introduce destructive viruses to the company’s entire network.

·Software posted on the Web has sometimes been obtained illegally. According to an article in The New York Law Journal, if one of your employees downloads such software your company could be on the receiving end of a lawsuit.

·If an employee logs on to pornographic sites, and those sites are viewed (however unintentionally) by a colleague who finds them objectionable, your company can be sued for creating a hostile work environment.

·If an employee expresses unsavory ideas or makes threatening statements in email carrying your company’s dotcom address, the company’s reputation in cyber space becomes linked with those ideas.

As you can see, potential problems abound when Internet access becomes part of the way a company does business. However, you can greatly improve the chances of escaping such problems by utilizing two effective measures. First, establish and enforce a company-wide Internet Use Policy. Second, utilize content-filtering or -blocking software.

Internet Use Policy. A written set of groundrules for Internet use not only gives employees a guideline for what is and isn’t acceptable, but helps protect your company from any legal fallout. When putting your policy together, consider these suggestions:

·Don’t outlaw personal use of the Internet; doing so will breed resentment. Not only that, but it’s almost guaranteed that employees will ignore such a directive. If they do, they’ll probably treat the rest of your Internet policy with equal contempt.

·Allow personal surfing, e-mail, chatting, etc., but make it clear that these activities should take up no more time than a walk to the water cooler or be done during the employee’s lunch hour.

·Forbid the workplace accessing of pornographic, hate, bomb-making or other unsavory sites with which your company name should not be associated.

·Don’t allow employees to download software to their hard drives, greatly decreasing the possibility of a virus attack.

·The Internet Use Policy should clearly outline the specific disciplinary action to be taken for violations. Writing in 1999, Context Newsire noted that “when someone realizes ‘I will lose my job if I look at a porno site,’ they won’t do it.” 

·Have each employee read and sign the Policy, lending it validity.

·Plan to re-evaluate and update the policy regularly to keep pace with changing technology.

Filtering/Blocking Software.       A good Internet Use Policy is only the first step. Experts in the legal and technical fields almost uniformly recommend filtering/blocking software to ensure that employees don’t access sites that might leave you legally liable.

A wise choice is WinProxy, a powerful Windows-based proxy-server software whose Site Restriction capabilities offer three sophisticated filter options: SmartFilter, BlackListing and WhiteListing.

SmartFilter is exactly what its name implies: a “smart” filter. SmartFilter works in a much more effective way than the more commonly-used content filters.

Content filters merely scan Web pages for inappropriate words before deciding whether or not to accept them. It’s thus possible to download pornographic photos, for example, because the pages containing the photos may not contain words on the “taboo” list—in fact, those pages may contain no words at all! There’s another negative aspect to content filters, too. Sometimes they reject perfectly good Web pages because they contain a word considered inappropriate. The classic example: if the word “breast” is on the list, pages dealing with breast cancer won’t be loaded.

SmartFilter works in a far more intelligent manner. It “knows” which sites are inappropriate and rejects them. That’s because SmartFilter works from a long and comprehensive list of inappropriate sites that fit categories such as Sex, Drugs, Hatespeech, Crime, Extreme, Mature, and Nude. The list is compiled, indexed and cataloged into a database by people who are experts in site filtering. Since new Web sites appear (and old sites disappear) every day, the list is constantly updated to remain effective. As a SmartFilter user you can download updates as often as you like.

Briefly, here’s how SiteFilter works: You check one or more boxes of site types you want automatically rejected. Let’s say you check Sex and Hatespeech. You then click “Enforce This List.”  From then on (unless changed by you), access to any URL containing sex or hatespeech content will be refused.

When you first test WinProxy you receive a free trial of SmartFilter. Subscriptions are available thereafter for a nominal fee.

BlackListing allows you to block access to specific sites chosen by you. In other words, if you specify that access to www.xxx.com is not permited, your employees won’t be able to visit that site. However, they can visit sites you haven’t blacklisted.

WhiteListing is the opposite of BlackListing. It allows you to permit access only to sites chosen by you. In other words, if you list only two sites (www.goodsite.com and www.school.com), those become the only two sites your employees can visit.

In addition to these three powerful filtering mechanisms, WinProxy’s User’s Tab lets you easily restrict the hours during which the Internet can be accessed by employees. By the way, WinProxy offers much more than filtering. For starters, it puts a protective “firewall” between your computers and the Internet, providing a high level of security from hackers and other intruders. All your company’s computers can be online simultaneously, accessing the Web through a single modem (or any other type of connection) on the computer that hosts the WinProxy software. This results in cost-savings, since only one Internet Service Provider is needed.
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