Website Blocked: Interview with an Expert

On many days it seems as though the internet is the only thing that can get us through a day at work. When we have a moment, we can escape to our favorite website. Wait a minute...website blocked? Why am I not able to view Myspace anymore? What happened to ESPN? Websites seem to disappear as quickly as we find them at work. What's the IT department's deal anyway?

Charlie Elmore, an IT professional, gives me the low down on why (and how) companies block websites.

Q. Why does the IT department block a certain website?

A. Generally, most businesses use website filtering that is done automatically. The company I work for subscribes to a service provided by Sonicwall. All the internet traffic runs though these machines which monitors and filters web usage. There are multiple levels of control offered to the administrator. There are certain categories that you can have the Sonicwall block like: social sites, pornography, downloads, sex, etc. So in truth, IT does very little specific site blocking. Some unwanted websites do slip through the filters, and are added to a "blacklist" manually. For example hulu.com is a cool site where you can watch TV shows. If you look at this from the perspective of a supervisor, it's a distraction, and time waster.

In some cases, a supervisor will notice the use of a certain website and ask IT to block it.

Web usage is also monitored by bandwidth used by specific users, and bandwidth directed at a certain site. If IT notices that a specific website is getting a large number of "hits" and using a large amount of bandwidth, and it's found to have no relation to work being preformed, it is blocked.

Q. What do you look for when blocking a website? Do you use specific keywords that come up in a website?

A. Websites are filtered by what shows up in the URL, and in the description. Some websites (such as www.downloads.com) are pretty obvious, but some are more difficult. IT doesn't actively search for websites to block, but there are thousands of new web pages posted every day. As a result, there is always new data on these sites and older sites that may cause them to get caught by the filter. We have had instances of websites being accessible one day and not the next due to added content.

If a site with high bandwidth usage is noticed, we take a look at the site. Everyone takes a look at the news in the morning and at lunch, so the hits on these sites are high, but are not typically blocked because supervisors don't find that it wastes employee's time, so they don't request them to be blocked. On the other hand, a site like youtube.com is blocked because it's clearly a time waster, and additionally streaming video to your computer is a huge bandwidth hog.

Q. Is there a way to go to the IT department to get a site unblocked?

A. Yes. A supervisor can request that a site be unblocked. For example, employees in a specific department at the company I work for found that they could research persons that had filed workers comp claims on myspace.com to investigate the injuries. So it was unblocked for that department.

Q. What trends lead you to believe a website should be blocked? Do you look at the amount of time a person spends on a site?

A. Generally, if a website is using large amounts of bandwidth (media, video or audio streaming, flash pages) they stand out on the usage logs, and are blocked to conserve bandwidth for company use. If any of our company's applications are starved for bandwidth being used by internet surfing, it causes slowdowns and decreases productivity.

Q. Do you block external email servers like AOL or is it the content you are blocking?

A. Email filtering is a totally different game all together. Just to scratch the surface in regards to personal email accounts being accessed at work: unless a supervisor asks it to be blocked, it is allowed because it uses very little bandwidth unless users are downloading attachments. The problem sometimes comes up that the site used to log into the personal email is blocked because it falls under a filter category.

Q. What is the industry standard for web usage at work?

A. There have been thousands of surveys polling departments about usage and filtering. Generally speaking, 80% of employees say they spend at least an hour a day using the internet for personal use.

Q. Are websites blocked because of people abusing the privilege? Does it just take one person?

A. Most companies have a computer use policy set by HR. If people are found violating the computer use policy, including visiting internet sites that are in contradiction to the policy, they are blocked. In some cases it can take only 1 person. It all depends on how many times the site is visited, and if the site is media heavy, it gets flagged considerably quicker.

IT departments aren't as mean as employees make them out to be. The truth is, as long as people are not disrupting workflow and keep their usage to a reasonable level, we have very little concern. But all it takes is a few people to ruin it for everyone. Our priority is keeping all technology running smoothly. In order to do that, certain things have to be restricted.