Free interim filtering solutions

[synaesthesia]

I've recently taken over a primary school with severely lackluster filtering. Whilst we take the time to research proper solutions, are there any recommended "free" solutions I can set up for them in the interim period? I'm aware of Smoothwall Express, as well as the likes of Squid and Dansguardian but something that's quick and easy to install in the first instance would be ideal.

Any input would be gratefully received, I intend to go down the Smoothwall express route if all else fails .

[DJ-1701]

Haven't used it as a filter, but you could do this with Untangle. Untangle will require a dedicated machine or Vmachine to install.

 

The following link has a list of the free Apps you can use https://www.untangle.com/untangle-ng-firewall/software-packages/

[strawberry]

Does your router have a filtering solution? Our drayteks come with a 30 day free trial.

[synaesthesia]

Router is inaccessible and ISP (Virgin) are about as useless as they come. I have a draytek I can use but don't really want to put anything like that in the way. Quite liking this Untangle though!

[CyberDrac]

Have you considered at a basic level OpenDNS to keep the very worst of the Internet at bay?

[synaesthesia]

OpenDNS is one of the reasons the school is having difficulties so staying well clear of that. I think I'm settled on Untangle, it's good and easy enough that by the time it was mentioned by @DJ-1701 I have it installed in a VM, configured, played with categories and basic filtering on the web filter lite and a test client going through it fine. It's only downfall, like any of the free offerings will be no SSL inspection however it's going to be a vast improvement on what they have and will certainly keep things safe until we get a proper appliance in place.

[ehg]

If you have a spare PC try pfsense its an open source firewall and can do filtering as well.. plus its free

[twin--turbo]

I inadvertently took down our entire network with Untangle. The VM's two "Bridged" Ethernet ports created an L2 routing loop. Took less than a minuet for the core switch to be crippled.

 

I did not really like it then ~2008 and only looked at it once since. There was something about it that I found too unintuitive... Or they were trying to push subscriptions, can't remember.

 

1999-2011 We were on Squid + Squid Guard.

 

 

OpenDNS is no longer free.

 

pFsense uses Squid and DansGuardian. Did try it once but our Home Rolled scripts on plain linux did a better job.

 

 

ClearOS was another good option.

[Areku]

also e2guardian is a fork of dansguardian, which is still being updated. and is the solution e2bn sell. e2guardian binaries are free to download/compile yourself.

[Wave9_Lee]

Hi Synaesthesia,

 

Sophos provide a free trial that you can install on your own server. Link is here https://secure2.sophos.com/en-us/products/utm-9/free-utm-trial.aspx

 

If you need help with configuration and set up, get in touch, happy to help. If you don't have any spare hardware, again, get in touch.

 

regards

 

Lee

[synaesthesia]

Cheers all. Still favouring Smightwall/Lightspeed but always open to other ideas. I've quotes on the wall for the big players (SW/LS/Bloxx/Sophos). For comparisons sake though, would anyone say E2Guardian is, despite being open source, a suitable option? It seems good on paper, as it doesn't entirely rely on blocklists like the majority of other free players. Plus it does SSL inspection. It's then just a case of support. Not entirely likely it'll be what I put in place but like to consider everything. The big thing I can't seem to find a proper answer for is if it has the ability to run transparently, reliably.

Loving Untangled as an interim though, it's a wonderfully simple setup and certainly a lot better than nothing.

Edited April 18, 2016 by synaesthesia

[Areku]

we use protex (e2bns badged e2guardian), does the job, only thing id like to see it do which it currently does not do (or at least i cant find) is some passive list logging (for cp/anti terror etc). Yeah you can get logs of access back, but id like to option to "ok show me all the hits for CP issues"

[SchoolsBroadband]

PM'd with the solution via our cloud based platform