NY District Realizes Security Improvements with New Web Filter

• By Scott Aronowitz
• 09/15/09

Schoharie Central School District of Schoharie, NY has announced it has seen significant improvements in its Web safety measures with the recent implementation of Tru-View Technology Web filtering service from Bloxx.

The biggest Web security problem the district was facing with its previous filtering software was anonymous proxies, which allow users to surf the Web anonymously, preventing filters from blocking students' access to sites considered inappropriate for some schools.

"Bloxx Web filter's power at blocking anonymous proxies is unrivalled," said David Holmes, Network & Systems Technician at SCSD. "In one year's use I have only had one instance of users' accessing a proxy site that the Bloxx appliance missed, and that was quickly rectified by their outstanding support department. With our previous solution the students could find new proxy servers faster than I could block them."

The Tru-View Technology also offers filtering features like instant analysis and categorization of sites not already included in the built-in database, as well as automatic updating of the status of accessed sites whose content has changed. In addition, the software offers a "sensitivity slider," which allows users to set, for each filtering category, a level of sensitivity from 0 to 100 to determine the degree to which such sites are filtered. This allows educators to monitor student Web use at varying degrees, for example opting to block all sites that contain adult content, but allowing students to access travel sites, which may offer helpful geographical and anthropological research information, with far fewer restrictions.

Bloxx Web filtering models are priced according to the size of the network. A chart of the models offered, as well as accompanying datasheets, can be found here.