All Sourceforge.net Being Blocked by SmartFilter 482
An unnamed reader writes: "I just noticed that all sites. '*.sourceforge.net' are being blocked by all corporations using SmartFilter including mine. SmartFilter lists all of them as 'MP3' sites. Below is the error I get. How come they do not block Microsoft? I can download an MP3 player from there, too (Media Player does play MP3s)." Here's the error: "Access is restricted to the site (http://www.sourceforge.net/) you requested. Per the firm's Information Security & Privacy Policy, all Internet browsing is monitored and logged. Please contact the Information Security Center at ext 7114 for more information. SmartFilter Control List category MP3 Sites is restricted. " The aptly named SmartFilterWhere tool shows which sites are painted over by SmartFilter's broad brush; in this case, software development site (and Slashdot sister site) SourceForge is blocked by the latest SmartFilter versions -- 3.0, 3.0.1 and 3.1 -- but not version 2. You might also be interested in The Censorware Project's analysis of the efficacy of SmartFilter as applied to Utah schools and libraries, or Peacefire's explanation of how and how well SmartFilter works.
Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:2, Insightful)
I know, what else can corporations do, other than hire baby sitters for all the employees with net access.
But, in most cases, they are much more trouble than they are worth. Nothing lowers morale like big brother controlling where you go.
Sometimes the most useful sites are blocked. I remember working at a school district, I got NOTHING but complaints/questions about N2H2 [n2h2.com], the filtering solution we were using.
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:3, Insightful)
1) Make sure people are doing their jobs. You can tell this by looking at whether or not they produce what is required in the time they have to produce it.
2) You can make sure restrictions on computers are such that they can't install software and/or do what you don't want them to.
3) You can look over logs once in a while to find problem people.
Gasp! (Score:2, Informative)
Unfortunately, it *seems* all too common to *me* that supervisors don't know jack about the people working under them. The novel idea of making a programmer a manager of the programming department seems to escape some people.
*sigh*
Note my sig...
Re:Gasp! (Score:3, Funny)
You mean like neither of ours know we're cruising around on
Peter Principle (Score:4, Interesting)
My solution to this problem: make pay independent of position. A good programmer should get paid more than an average manager.
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:3, Insightful)
If there was no net, he'd jsut be on the phone or something anyway -- there were distractions in the workplace before the internet, after all.
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:2, Insightful)
Also that's why I've set up a CGI-proxy [jmarshall.com]
Pi
REQUEST REMOVAL!! (Score:5, Informative)
1. Go to the URL and enter "http://www.sourceforge.net" into the 'URL 1' field. Hit 'check URL'
2. The next page should say "http://www.sourceforge.net MP3" if it is still listed.
3. On the dropbox on the right, select 'remove from list' and hit 'send request'
Them bosses need all the help they can get (Score:2)
Re:REQUEST REMOVAL!! (Score:2)
Internal Server Error
The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.
Please contact the server administrator, webadmin@securecomputing.com and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error.
More information about this error may be available in the server error log.
Re:REQUEST REMOVAL!! (Score:2)
they'll prolly think that we are launching some sort of attack on them - and blacklist
Re:REQUEST REMOVAL!! (Score:3, Funny)
www.cnn.com
www.nytimes.com
www.washingtonpost.com
www.wsj.com
www.google.com
www.yahoo.com
www.datek.com
www.travelocity.com
www.orbitz.com
www.microsoft.com
That should just about put an end to them.
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:2)
Great idea. Alert the user that he/she will be logged as having accessed site "x", and that he/she may be asked to explain or justifie visiting that site.
But don't block any sites.
Re:Filtering solutions generally stink (Score:5, Funny)
of course they are (Score:4, Funny)
"violation of intelectual proparty rights" ?!? (Score:2)
I understand that you're being sarcastic, but what I don't understand is how they can make this argument. How does Free Software violate existing proprietary intellectual property rights.
Just because I make something that performs the same functions and has the same features as a proprietary application (ex XMMS vs Winamp), how am I violating intellectual property?
Re:"violation of intelectual proparty rights" ?!? (Score:2)
The evil monopolistic corporations claim that the GPL undermines intellectual property by its "viral" nature, that would "infect" all proprietary code that would be shipped together with GPL'ed software, and would force it to fall under the GPL as well.
This is of course utter nonsense (GPL only spreads to code derived from GPL'ed code, but not to code that is merely shipped on the same CD as GPL'ed code), but those evil monopolistic empires want you to believe otherwise in order to protect their own selfish interests. Indeed, the only way GPL'ed code really threatens proprietary code is by being superior in quality, and more consumer friendly ;-)
Just because I make something that performs the same functions and has the same features as a proprietary application (ex XMMS vs Winamp), how am I violating intellectual property?
You would not violate copyright by doing so, but depending on your jurisdiction, you might violate patents (see Fraunhofer vs. free mp3 players), trademarks (see the Adobe vs Killustrator case), or trade secrets (DeCSS). Of course, all 3 examples are pretty dodgy, and heavily depend not only on jurisdiction, but also on who interprets the law...
Re:of course they are (Score:2)
Offtopic perhaps, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
As the CTO of in international company, I see a lot of people around me who cannot spell. Some are VERY clever people, but indeed, some of them will probably never grow to become managers (let alone CEOs), simple becuase they cannot write (and that includes spelling).
Now this may not bother you - in which case, that is fine. But if you ever want to become the pointy-haired guy who earns US$150k instead of being the tech who "knows more" but earns $50k, things like spelling, as well as knowledge of geography, politics and current affairs are exactly the things that make a difference.
Being the pointy-haired guy means being able to put together a good presentation, being able to sit next to another CEO on the aiplane and talk intelligently about the state of the industry, and being able to address 100 people confidently.
The good news is: this stuff is learnable. If you can learn C++ or Java, you can certainly learn "English". Advice: this "English" language is as important as those other languages if you want a good resume.
Again, no value expressed here: it is perfectly OK to want to be the guy who makes less but works fewer hours and says what he thinks.
Mike
Oh and... (Score:2)
Honest.
Michael
Re:of course they are (Score:2)
Back in the day, Anderson Consulting was a very renowned employer...
Response by horny teens (Score:5, Funny)
Man, we got to check this out. It must have some sweet porn or soemthing on it.
Yeah, we got to get there. All right, bypassing filtering software...oh, yeah. Here it is! Dude, we're in! Sweet porn, here we come!
Click that one - Jboss! Must be a dominatrix or something.
WTF - there's no porn here! It...it's just geek code stuff.
The filter tricked us. Dude, those filter guys are so sneaky.
Next thing you know, they'll be trying to get us to study or something.
Kind way of asking them to be unblocked... (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.securecomputing.com/cgi-bin/filter_w
and search for sourceforge.net. In the results, you can suggest a recomended they be removed from the list.
Re:Kind way of asking them to be unblocked... (Score:2)
Hmm... Why should sourceforge sue? They have maligned me via brewnix.sourceforge.net. I may have a case.
Re:Kind way of asking them to be unblocked... (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, I checked it out and you're right. They have miscategorized Brewnix [slashdot.org] as an MP3 site. I've submitted a request that it be reclassified as a Drug site, along with Budweiser [budweiser.com], Miller [miller.com], and Samuel Adams [samadams.com].
Re:Kind way of asking them to be unblocked... (Score:2)
Re:Kind way of asking them to be unblocked... (Score:5, Informative)
use this link to request sourceforge removal directly [securecomputing.com]
and
use this to list microsoft.com as hate speech site [securecomputing.com]
I noticed sf.net isn't blocked (Score:5, Informative)
2600.com (Score:5, Informative)
Go here [securecomputing.com] and enter the sourceforge URL. On the right, "Suggest a Change" and tell them that it should not be on their list. Make your voice heard!
gnu.org? (Score:5, Funny)
Does SmartFilter gnu.org [gnu.org] as a religious web site?
I just listed Slashdot! (Score:4, Funny)
classification of sites: Maybe... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:2600.com (Score:2, Informative)
Listing SourceForge.net in the "MP3" category was almost certainly an accident. Secure Computing/Smartfilter has been very quick to resolve such issues in the past, typically providing automatic updates within a week or less.
Finally, if you want 100 percent accurate filtering software, you might as well give up right now. The nice thing about SmartFilter, if there is anything nice about any of these products, is that the links are reviewed and categorized by humans -- who are good, and trained, but not completely infallible. While processing thousands of sites, someone might hit the wrong button now and then. It's not a conspiracy, folks.
System admins who are frustrated by requests to un-block the site should simply add it to their local exemption file, at least until they recieve the next update to the control list.
-=Ivan
(disclosure: I used to work there a long time ago. There's no confidential information in this post. This message doesn't represent their official views or policies or anything. All facts stated in this message are potentially subtly incorrect.)
They've always blocked stuff unfairly... (Score:5, Informative)
His discussion of the legal risks of decrypting these blacklists is fascinating too, and (as he likes to say) "a topic in itself." He would like to open up the source to his SmartFilter-decryption tool but feels the legal risk is too high. How sad is that?
Here's Secure Computing's definition of the "extreme" category [securecomputing.com], and the examples they give ("Pixman's Vault of Porn Pix", "Bizarre & Maximum Perversion").
You can confirm Seth's findings using Secure Computing's own SmartFilterWhere [securecomputing.com].
It asks for your name and phone number; you have my permission to make some up. As of December 7, at 9:45 PM EST, that CGI operates with a Control List updated on December 5 and confirms all of Seth's results that I tried. By the time you read this, they may have quickly fixed all the errors he published, loaded in an up-to-the-minute Control List, and proudly announced that their software is now perfect.
Re:They've always blocked stuff unfairly... (Score:2)
Sometimes I wonder if they block sites for any stupid reason they can think up, or if they do a massive search for "sex" or something in a page or domain name and don't police their own results.
Looks Like SmartFilter has a new category (Score:2, Funny)
So, they have the new "Suckass" category up now?
Re:They've always blocked stuff unfairly... (Score:2)
Have you actually read sci.archaeology lately? That's really a pretty fair description.
Re:occult (Score:3, Insightful)
They seem to rate them by the amount of political power that the factions can mobilize (both for and against). There is no other justification that appears to match the criteria in a (reasonably) predictable way.
You can justify this on commercial grounds as well as on grounds of prejudice. What's really unfair is that you can't find out what the criteria are. I wouldn't really mind if the KKK put out some blocking software, but I'd sure want to know before I accidentally gave them some money. (Well, actually I'd want the purchasers to know, but that wouldn't include me. I'd rather choose for myself. [Might be worth buying as a source of sites to check out though, if you could read the filter files.])
Information vs. obsession (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, access to information is, most likely, the best antidote against obsession. For instance, do you think the 9/11 terrorists would be so willing to suicide if they had ready access to alternative ideas and theories about religion and the afterlife? Limited access to information is the best recipe to fanatism I know.
Re:They've always blocked stuff unfairly... (Score:2)
Cheesy porn (Score:2)
It would almost definitely end up sounding really bad, like the ones in this article on bad porn awards [guardian.co.uk] but it would be worth it to make something that was unblockable by any type of systematic filter.
Re:They've always blocked stuff unfairly... (Score:2, Insightful)
- took everyone at my place of employment,
- showed them a random sampling of 500 websites,
- and asked them to categorize them as appropriate or inappropriate for filtering at work,
you would find that everyone agrees on the apropriateness of about 490 of those sites. The problem is doing that with 5 billion pages, which may not even be the same tomorrow. There is also the fact that what is appropriate here is different from what is appropriate at an elementary school, so you can't use the same list everywhere. (the same experiment at an elementary school would also yield similar agreement, though on a different set of pages)However, there sure are a lot of things that obviously should be blocked. You whine and complain that there is a small fraction of sites that reside near the critical cusp (and truly it is a small fraction when you consider the amounts of easily categorized commerce, puff, drivel, and unfettered debauchery on the web). What is the alternative? No filters? I would argue that easily half of the web should properly be blocked from schools, up to and including high schools.
Marilyn's extremity (Score:4, Informative)
If I was a parent I'd be thanking Zeus that they blocked that freak's site.
Marilyn is no more extreme than Alice Cooper or Lou Reed or freakin' David Bowie. Sure, he looks pretty crazy, but no crazier than the dude that works in the local video store (and he's spent a lot more on his wardrobe). I'm no fan of his music, but reading interviews with him he is hardly "freakish" or "extreme"; he votes Republican; his views are not that far out of the mainstream, and after his music was blamed for Columbine he wrote one of the most intelligent responses [rollingstone.com] to the tragedy that I came across in the media that spring (including on slashdot; my apologies JonKatz). The only reason he's so controversial is that he's intentionally giving the finger to the religious right, which is most likely his family background. So he takes a lot of his symbolism from Christianity and performs in a manner that is provocative and mocking. Of course it pisses those people off, it's meant to, but it's hardly a threat to your children unless you want to keep them closed-minded. (It's definitely not a threat to your children if you believe in Zeus, as the parent post implies!)
You got to admire how clever he is too (though admittedly he's picking on an easy target); in response to many of the criticisms of his treatment of Christianity he promised in this interview [beliefnet.com] to "balance my songs with a wholesome Bible reading" so fans can "examine the virtues of wonderful 'Christian' stories of disease, murder, adultery, suicide, and child sacrifice. Now that seems like 'entertainment' to me."
Not Blocked Here (Score:2, Informative)
Anyone know why this might be?
Scott.
Re:Not Blocked Here (Score:2)
Re:Not Blocked Here (Score:2, Informative)
So you're company may or may not block MP3 sites, or as you say, the db could be out of date. These filters are pretty flexible rule-wise, and so depending on how it's configured, it could be really stringent or not. Maybe they are just logging activity rather than blocking (??), that's possible too.
-s
How dare you, michael! (Score:3, Funny)
Frankly, I'm shocked that I am not revered by all of Slashdot. My contributions to the world of anti-censorware research are comparable to the contributions of Jesus Christ to the field of religion. I won more awards from that project than Michael won in his whole damned life.
Do not underestimate me. I will be heard.
Now's the time.... (Score:2, Flamebait)
blast it.... blast it mercilessly people...
take every step to blast ANY non-open-source filtering system....
OH, if anyone tries to tell me that squid is too hard to configure... Please let me smack you.. I never touched squid before in my life... last friday I was mandated to install a filtering system for our intranet (spawned by a user's need to view kiddie porn on company computers) I downloaded and installed squid today... it's working perfect and the porn filters that are freely available work just fine.. if they want to add other "naughty" sites, it takes exactly 30 seconds to add it to a flat-text file... even a MSCE coud do it.
paying for any type of filtering system is pure stupidity and would only be reccomended by incompetent sysadmins/netadmins.
Re:Now's the time.... (Score:2)
That is a _real_ crime, there is a real victim, and who wants to work with someone like that?
Re:Now's the time.... (Score:2, Troll)
Access denied. Stupidity not allowed on UNIX boxen.
"add it to a flat-text file... even a MSCE coud do it."
No they couldn't. An MCSE would be asking "What do I click on to open this 'flat-text file'???"
"pure stupidity and would only be reccomended by incompetent sysadmins/netadmins"
See above.
- Jester
Re:Now's the time.... (Score:2)
This works *so* well that you can bypass pretty much any web proxy by going through open tcp ports.
Actually, with OpenSSH access on a server somewhere you can set up an encrypted SOCKS proxy with:
ssh -p ${openport} -C -D ${proxyport} -N ${ssh_server}
The point your browser's proxy setting to localhost:${proxyport} and away you go.
Why are you helping them? (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead, vote to make NYTIMES.COM and CNN.COM a "Criminal Skills" site. When the bosses start finding that smartfilter is effecting THEIR browsing, maybe they'll think twice before interfering in YOUR browsing.
Yes, being stupid will solve all our problems... (Score:2)
There are legitamate uses of filtering software. And in some places (elementary schools, unsupervised children) where its a choice between filtered internet or no internet.
Just like 12-year old Kenny can't go into Wal-Mart by himself and by the latest Eminem CD.
And guess what? My internet isn't filtered and neither is yours (you are reading a slashdot forum after all), and I don't think anyone is interested in filtering you net usage anyways.
So please, keep the desk-chair militias at bay.
Re:Yes, being stupid will solve all our problems.. (Score:2)
I have two more choices. You could *gasp*, supervise the children. Or, far better than ineffective black-list filters that let porn through while blocking Dick Armey's web site, you could provide a white-list filter that only allows pre-screened URLs through.
Of course, when I was a kid, we could buy albums by the Dead Kennedys without our parents holding our hands.
Getting pr0n was a lot tougher back then, but you can trust that I was able to find it despite the fact that I couldn't go into a store and buy it.
> My internet isn't filtered and neither is yours
Not yet at least...
Re:Yes, being stupid will solve all our problems.. (Score:2)
Keep asinine comments about "militia" to yourself when people are simply attempting to get some action out of the apathy that surronds us.
Re:Why are you helping them? (Score:5, Funny)
well? what are you waiting for? :)
cLive ;-)
Web filters are problematic (Score:4, Insightful)
My company uses SurfControl's [surfcontrol.com] web filter product. In my experience of trying to administer the thing, is that it *usually* gets the catagory right. Supposedly these filter makers are verifying their databases, of which you pay through the nose to subscribe to. I've found about a 3-5% error rate, meaning they've miscatagorized that many of the total catagorized sites and this usually draws some level of corrective action to change the blockage.
My hunch is that these guys (filter makers) wrote a search engine to do the catagorization and are just doing a dictionary score to wieght a page and make a decision on the results. So SourceForge probably scored high on the words "Download" and "MP3", or something like that, and since they both probably occur alot seeing as how there are alot of MP3 tools on that site for download it got catagorized as such. This doesn't make it right, but I'm willing to bet that no human said "hey let's block SourceForge because we don't like it and that'll piss everyone off".
Most likely, the admins using the big-brother-ware in question can override the catagory and/or create an exception rule to allow people through to mis-blocked sites. But that depends on corporate policy. My company adopted a "if it's something you use for work, we'll unblock it right away" policy that works pretty well and they've followed through on it too. However, there is a possibility that someone would place implicit trust in the filter and not want to change anything they block. This would be bad (IMHO) because, just like a search engine or anything else, it's not perfect and these things are subject to human error in the end. I can tell you it's cut down the amount of pr0n bandwidth being used on my network, which is really nice because my downloads take way less time now.
-s
suggestion (Score:2)
Re:suggestion (Score:2)
SmartFilter denied access to the URL http://util.anonymizer.com/cgi-bin/freeaction.cgi
It matches the category Sexual content.
Metafilter is a news/events blog.
Unpleasant at best (Score:2, Redundant)
They also have another interesting and potentially more controversial filtering category: "Anonymizer". Try plugging http://www.anonymizer.com [anonymizer.com] into that box on the link above. Thin legal ice, if you ask me.
Apologies from us here at SmartFilter Corp. (Score:5, Funny)
It appears our QA department inadvertently made an error in the data files for SmartFilter. SourceForge is not, technically, banned as being an MP3 site, but is in a new category we added called 'Sites for Geeky Losers'. The pointer for this category has remained pointed at 'MP3 Sites' in our symbol table. We will be fixing this in our next release.
Regards,
Chuck "Jesus" Smythe
SmartFilter Corp. -- Banning the sites that we don't like.
Filtering software isnt the answer. (Score:5, Interesting)
Honestly, when public schools are underfunded, and hardworking teachers are underpaid and under-rewarded, should schools really be spending money on software that has been proven time and again to be ineffective? I haven't got this program to test, but how much of google's cache do they block, I wonder? And the Usenet archives? Between those, I imagine you could get anything you wanted anyways. My experience with the censorware at work has been it even blocks Slashdot on some days, but never anything else. It blocks a few online game sites, like Sony's Station, but not much else. I don't sit at work and browse porn, but I've loaded pages before that had plenty of it (people really need to identify whats in the links they email me) and the censorware didnt stop it at all.
So I ask you: Censorware that arguably does as much harm as good? Or raises for teachers and administrative staff who could better nuture teens' growth away from questionable sites as it is? It doesn't take much for someone to walk thru a computer lab now and then, and anyone turning their monitor off quickly is rather obvious. Censorware is a leech-like entity, and rates only slightly above spam mailers in my opinion (only because they once had, deep down inside, an urge to do something good--or so I like to believe).
But taking an active role in childrens education about such things, and occassionally checking in on them while they're surfing are far better alternatives than spending money thats going to limit so much of the good with only a little of the bad.
Re:Filtering software isnt the answer. (Score:2)
Where if enough people use it, it gets better -- but never perfect mind you.
Instead of some kind of automatic keyword system, schools and people go through the internet and start black-listing web sites. Of course all USENET and chat should be blocked for all but the oldest kids.
And then when an inappropriate web site is found by anyone using the system, it gets black listed. Of course, black-listed sites should go into a queue to be verified.
But thats basically it.
Re:Filtering software isnt the answer. (Score:2)
The Truth About Filtering Software (Score:5, Insightful)
Companies have all sorts of liability that they have to worry about. Management installs filtering software to cover their asses in sexual harassment situations, or in this case, intellectual property rights.
That way when the RIAA comes banging on the doors of your company because the employees are downloading mp3s, they can innocently point to the filtering software then bring down the hammer of god on the people who circumvented the filtering software.
Really, it's nothing personal and has very little to do with you.
Jeez, people. Calm down. (Score:5, Insightful)
Traditionally, I've been against filtering software, under the "if you treat people like children, they won't dissapoint you" philosophy. Unfortunately, in examining logs BEFORE we turned on the filtering, people were doing a great job of acting like children beforehand. Reporting on a days worth of logs on the 'sex' category generated a 150 page (small print) report, covering about 50 employees. These were NOT banner adds and spam mail. After the filter went on, it went to about 20 pages. After a well placed firing for an extreme example, it went down to about 3.
There are a few things you have to consider when dealing with filtering software.
1. The people categorizing URL's and sites are not much better than trained monkeys. Just because a site gets blocked isn't part of a conspiracy. Just a TMIF (trained monkey input failure) event. Usually they correct it within a week.
(Side note: My favorite mis-categorization was when a dog breeding site was classified as a pornography site)
2. Filters are unfortunately a necessary evil in this day and age, since companies (mostly larger ones) MUST show that they are activly preventing the development of a 'hostile environment' toward protected groups, such as women and minorities. Filters are an easy way of doing that.
3. Filters by themselves are useless. Its amazing the number of things that they don't catch, and methods of by-passing them are out there. You have to keep the logs, and actually look at them. Filters are only alerts, not real preventitive measures.
4. Also, you have to take care that someone in your company won't use them for 'evil', like some middle manager on a witch hunt. You have to have good, fair policies in place covering Internet usage and trusted individuals with good ethics to see those policies are being followed.
In the last 18 months, my company has gone from having many gross violations of our Internet usage policies to very few violations. Most people can get to most the things they want to, and most, if not all of the 10K full time employees are pretty happy with the arrangement, or at least I haven't heard any complaints. For better or worse, the content filter and daily review of log reports is primarily responsible for that.
Re:Jeez, people. Calm down. (Score:2, Interesting)
I work for a company that delivers web based training & knowledge development. If one of our customers experiences an outage of a week because of some TIMF, the damage can not be repaired because of lost momentum. It could easily kill our company in a week.
Beating the Censorship horse. (Score:3, Insightful)
Censorship that is justifiable must be able to say and prove what it is censoring. Reasonable and trusted people must be able to check, and if you want to limit the number of people who are allowed to check you had better have an excruciatingly good reason. (Weaponizing anthrax comes to mind.)
Um, in order to be censorship, this must significantly hamper the ability of the users involved to access information/speech, yes?
They can look up anything they please at *home*.
How is the work filtering policy censoring what they have access to?
The company presumably has terms of service along the lines of "the company's computers are to be used for work-related purposes only". Where's the problem?
I called the extension (Score:5, Funny)
I then pointed out that this number was on the web page that had the explaination to why the site was being blocked and that it was posted on Slashdot. This corporate lackey kept up his charade and asked what Slashdot was. Seriously, what kind of fool does this person think I am? I said I wasn't going to put up with this type of corporate behavior and someone was going to set things right. He finally took my name and number down and said he'd get back to me. I hope that my actions will correct this situation.
Hmmm... some security personnel has just shown up at my cubicle wanting to talk to me. They no doubt want to congratulate me on my pro-active response to the situation.
Just ask . . (Score:2)
Filtering isn't easy..... (Score:2)
My advice, if you have a legitimate buissness reason for accessing SourceForge (which a lot of us do) then go to you IT department and get it removed, or added for you. Who knows maybe they had some problems with something on it, or more then likely they don't even know.
pr0n at work (Score:2)
What can be worse than sitting at your desk in your cubicle/office, with a boner and one of those "urges" to pull the "manual override", and not being able to do anything about it (without risking charges of indecency, at least)
And what would happen if your coworker (or boss?!) came in while you were viewing porn, and asked you to get up and walk to a meeting or something, while you were still 'in the mood'
I know most of us guys have good control over our erectile functions, but... come on, it's gotta be a *bit* uncomfortable to be in that state and to try and talk business or something..
Maybe it's only me, but I just don't see the allure of viewing pr0n at work.
anyway.. tiz just my little rant
ext. 7114? (Score:2, Funny)
Confirmation (Score:2, Redundant)
Entire site down. (Score:3, Informative)
SmartFilter blocks Peacefire (Score:2)
So, SmartFilter is at least smart enough to block its critics...
Audit mode and monitoring a good alternative (Score:2)
I evaluated bunch of filter products a few years ago for a customer. Smartfilter nudged out SquidGuard because of the lower admin overhead.
They run it in audit mode on a small amount of categories considered inappropriate. The user has a choice to continue to the site after receiving a warning, and must explain their choice if they appear in our weekly reports.
Porn surfing at work went from about 1% of traffic to about 1,000 hits a week (counting ads as well).
They have been catching big downloaders for about two years before that. It certainly keeps those MP3 and warez doodz at bay. I can't undestand the economics of downloading. To download a CD in Australia costs A$90 or more for most sites. If you can get away with someone else paying for it, then it is "free"
Smartfilter is a pain in the rear (Score:2)
The software is garbage. Really, it's a pain in the rear. Worse, huge numbers of sites are misclassified. Every time I updated the control list, half a dozen employees would call because some legit business site had been incorrectly classified as pr0n and they could no longer access it. A great deal at only ~$4k per year (blech).
I tried to get them to use an open-source solution with no luck. If it didn't run under Windows and cost a fortune, they weren't interested. Pity.
How *I* use SmartFilter with their 'coach' mode. (Score:3, Informative)
SmartFilter offers four possible results for each category when a user attempts to visit a site on the filter list:
- Permit. Access is allowed, but logged by user-IP, URL, and category (if any)
- Deny. Block access, return a HTML page explaining what was blocked, and why. Same logging.
- Delay.. Access is permitted, but page returns after a delay (default 30 seconds). Same logging.
- Coach.. Access is blocked, but permit the user to 'click through' to the actual page. Either way, log access.
With the 'Coach' option, nobody is actually blocked from accessing any web site. However, for each new access to any 'questionable' site (based on categories from the SmartFilter database), the user is presented with warning page, and the opportunity to choose to continue, with the knowledge that their actions are logged and may be reviewed.Here is the interesting one:
The default HTML pages that SmartFilter ships with are rather boring. I've made a few changes to the 'Coach' page HTML to make it very clear what is going on -- bright icons and background, big WARNING banner at the top, and the text of our official "Internet Access Policy" (just in case the user somehow missed it when they signed their employment paperwork).
I'm hoping that 'coaching' will cut down on web access abuse and wasted time, while still allowing people to get to sites that they really need to access for their job, without getting people fired.
And best of all, the warning page breaks the never-ending cycle launched by those damn porn-site popup ads!
Microsoft/Hotmail (Score:2)
Given all the porn spam I get, why the hell is Hotmail not listed under the Sex category?
Think of this as a message from your boss (Score:3, Interesting)
So they've delegated that task to a retarded electronic babysitter.
Suck it up and be a good drone or update your resume and start looking for a better place to work.
A competent professional doesn't need to have his/her time and efficiency wasted by this kind of crap. Competent management doesn't hire people who need electronic babysitters.
Libel Lawsuits for fun and profit? (Score:2)
Not surprising (Score:4, Funny)
You think that's weird... (Score:3, Funny)
I don't even want to know.
Re:Wow this is crazy (Score:4, Insightful)
I recommend not jumping to sue every chance you get, there are too many lawsuits anyways.
The real solution is, of course, for companies to drop their contracts and un-installing the software.
Re:Wow this is crazy (Score:3, Interesting)
libel (Score:5, Informative)
- Make false statements of fact (or opinions that imply false statements of fact).
- Make those statements with negligence, recklessness, or with malice as to the truthfulness of the statements. Negligence does not apply to public figures.
- The statements must be published to a 3rd party.
- There must be damages. Damages are implied if criminal acts are stated.
I have detailed the requirements for libel (under Mass. law) in a motion for summary judgment. [sorehands.com]Re:Wow this is crazy (Score:2, Insightful)
Rather bad when your customer can't reach the demo..;)
Finally, a reason to use Linux! (Score:2, Funny)
I hear that if you run Linux, you never have sex. :)
Depends on the work... (Score:2)
Some IT security officers / Internet admins do have a clue. Then again, we generally do not need a diversion, like working on an OOS project in company hours, as our work is mostly fun.
Re:No OSS at work (Score:2)
Re:bullshit (Score:2)
It's less bogus than several
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Informative)
As an after thought, your company may have that category set to log. In which case you will likely get a visit from management wanting to discuss your mp3 habits during work hours.
Re:bullshit (Score:3, Insightful)
The headline "All Sourceforge.net Being Blocked by SmartFilter" applies perfectly to your statement: if an individual company chooses to use SmartFilter to block certain categories, all of sourceforge.net will be blocked, thus "all Sourceforge.net is being blocked by SmartFilter".
Personally, I think it's an interesting story that's worth posting. Many companies use open source software for their own development - I work for one. We're using at least one Sourceforge project, in fact. OTOH, many other companies might really wish to restrict access to Sourceforge, for the usual perverse legalistic and fascistic reasons. If it's true that Sourceforge was added to the Smartfilter list for those kinds of reasons, I think that's worth discussing.
Slashdot is in there (Score:2)
It would suck to work at a place that actually turned on that category.
We broke it. :) (Score:2)
Re:Question? (Score:2, Informative)
Or to be even more 1337 (Score:2)
http://033042125704/
Re:MP3 players, or MP3 files? (Score:3, Funny)
It appears that nobody has been blocking your access to crack, however.
The day someone needs "Gnome 2.0" to function (and works at a place that would block it) is the day I start killing puppies.
- A.P.