Find Pornographic Images on Home Areas

[pwds]

I've just been on a trawl for games in home areas and with a combination of software restriction policies and aggressive removal of *.bat, *.vbs, *.exe files to a holding area (in case any do turn out to be legit) feel I've got a handle on that problem.

 

What I have noticed though is some students were stupidly "hiding" game files in their My Pictures folders with topless or nude photos.

 

Clearly I am concerned that students who bring in files from home may choose to store them on their home areas and, even though the images were downloaded at home, the backlash from parents will be unpleasant.

 

I must also accept that despite the best efforts of EMBC and Tom at Smoothwall some images will get through from time to time.

 

As such it'd be great if we could scan for images that contain a high skin tone percentage. I acept this may have limited usefulness with non caucasian models but would at least mean we were being proactive in policing the issue.

 

Do you use any software in your school that does this? Would you recommend it?

 

What issues have you found doing this or have you ever been bitten for not doing so?

[gibbo_ap]

we have securus but have yet to properly implement it. when used correctly it has a skintone/boob image detector. wen we were shown it it did get confused by bald men but they were working on it at that time.

[SYNACK]

The software to do this is patchy at best and usually integrated into stuff like web filtering, the one thing that I could find that looked promising was this

 

http://www.yangsky.com/products/porndel/index.htm

 

Warning - cotains filtered demo images that are still unsafe for work

 

I have not used it but it could work.

Edited February 16, 2010 by SYNACK

[mac_shinobi]

where is the projects page - wasn't there a util made by one of the members that scans for file formats such as exe, images etc

 

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/scripts/346-administrators-nasty-file-search-v2-0-released.html

 

I thought there was another util made by bizell or w/e his id / name is

Edited February 16, 2010 by mac_shinobi

[Edu-IT]

where is the projects page - wasn't there a util made by one of the members that scans for file formats such as exe, images etc

 

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/scripts/346-administrators-nasty-file-search-v2-0-released.html

 

I thought there was another util made by bizell or w/e his id / name is

There is, yes, but it won't scan for specific image types, or at least it didn't when I used it. (Nudity etc)

[DaveMurphy]

Send the students a naughty warning letter home to their parents, they wont do it again

[Yoshimoto]

We have mandatory profiles so they can't save anything locally or anything in their profile, they have network shares to save work which are only 5mb so they either save work or nothing at all, they also have restrictions to what they can save on them, no pictures video, applications ect.

They can't even right click.

 

I think the first thing you should do is lock down profiles so they can no longer store stuff in them.

 

We also have a 8e6 content filter which does a great job.

 

Lock 'em down they cannot be trusted.

[glennda]

Wthey have network shares to save work which are only 5mb so they either save work or nothing at all

 

 

cor the students here are complaining they only get upto 1gb in year 12/13 (year 7's get 200mb) how can you do it with only 5mb or is it a typo? we have students with one word doc thats bigger then that!

 

sorry to take it off track!

 

But we use securus aswell (when its on as it is currently off) but that seems to pick up alot of stuff, or by the time its processed what was on the screen the snapshot is of the desktop!

[Yoshimoto]

Not a typo, they are advised to use only text and not pictures.

It's plenty of space if they're responsible.

We really don't have the time to babysit them.

As much as administration, teachers and parents would like us to.

[ICTNUT]

where is the projects page - wasn't there a util made by one of the members that scans for file formats such as exe, images etc

 

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/scripts/346-administrators-nasty-file-search-v2-0-released.html

 

I thought there was another util made by bizell or w/e his id / name is

 

ANFS has been withdrawn with the source being provided to EduGeek so it can be further worked upon, both anfs and EduSweep will do file search but do not have the ability to scan images for flesh tones in order to distinguish if an image is of a pornograhic nature.

 

Any software you find to do this will cost you, and it won't be cheap.

[glennda]

we have a problem here that part of the coursework requires screen shots so we cannot say no photo's, also we have lots of music suites so there are normally quite a few sound files which are quite large

[Yoshimoto]

Yes I'm sure I'd be in the same situation provided the staff and students use all the software to give to them, but lets just say they aren't that "advanced" and usually stick to word and don't bother learning how to use anything else let alone teach it... I am quite lucky in this way.

[dhicks]

both anfs and EduSweep will do file search but do not have the ability to scan images for flesh tones in order to distinguish if an image is of a pornograhic nature.

 

Is this actually that difficult? It'd be dead easy to write something to search through a bunch of folders, thumbnail any images found and shove them on to an HTML page. You could try sorting them in order of amount of "skin" colours found in the image, just a simple average. It'd need someone to visually check things over once a week, say, but it should be easy enough to spot anything dodgy quite quickly.

 

--

David Hicks

[Bezwick]

Our head has a very effective way of preventing these kind of images, whenever we happen to come accross a pupil with shall we say inappropriate images on. I have to print them off and give the to the head along with pupils name, date they were found etc.

The Head then sticks them in an envelope, along with a covering letter asking the offending parties parents to come in and discuss what we have found.

I have been here four years and only needed do this twice, word very quickly spreads and mass deletions take place. Lol.

I highly recommend it, if you really are having a problem with it.

[glennda]

Yes I'm sure I'd be in the same situation provided the staff and students use all the software to give to them, but lets just say they aren't that "advanced" and usually stick to word and don't bother learning how to use anything else let alone teach it... I am quite lucky in this way.

 

you are we have 6 file servers for the little people!

[plexer]

Snitch Enterprise Auditor - Detect, report and clean workplace pornography across the network.

[srochford]

The Head then sticks them in an envelope, along with a covering letter asking the offending parties parents to come in and discuss what we have found.

 

I think this is a good approach. You could spend forever searching for inappropriate images (what a fantastic job description!) It's much better to take a people centred approach to dealing with it.

 

I think whatever you do ought to fit with the school's general policy. Does someone go round on a regular basis and search bags, lockers, mobile phones etc to see if there are dodgy images? If not, then I don't think it's sensible to take the same approach with the computers.

[GrumbleDook]

@Beswick @srochfod Nooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Put them in an envelope but do not send them. Invite the parents in and offer them the chance to look at the offensive materials. If you mail them out then you could be at risk of the Obscene Publications Act. *Never* force someone else to look at possibly offensive adult materials.

[mattx]

Cor I dunno, adolescents looking at pictures of ladies & men in various states of undress - sounds quite normal to me......

[pwds]

Parents may argue that the school should be providing the means for said undressed people to be viewed though.... what students do on their own computers is of no concern beyond ensuring CEOP training is provided.

 

All the same I have gone off the idea. GrumbleDook will correct me if I'm wrong, but the following scenario has occurred to me-

 

1. Johnny in year eight is going out with Jessica in his form. She let him take some "special" pictures of her.

 

2. Johnny stupidly puts them on his home area.

 

3. IT Support find them as part of their pro-active sweep.

 

4. IT Support walk down to the file server and pull the plug as mandated for illegal images of this type.

 

5. Images are also on backup server- repeat step four.

 

6. IT Support ring the Police and hand over file server, backup server and all tapes.

 

At this point it may be prudent to rapidly leaving the building before the screams of rage from SMT, teachers, students, parents, Govenors and anyone else who cares to involve themselves can be heard.

 

Ignorance it has to be said is bliss.

[GrumbleDook]

All the same I have gone off the idea. GrumbleDook will correct me if I'm wrong, but the following scenario has occurred to me-

 

I've edited the order of these and paraphrased to try and reflect the reality of what would happen from the IT Tech's/NM's experience of it.

 

1. IT Support find a number of high flesh-tone pictures as part of their pro-active sweep. On a basic check of thumbnails one member of the team spots someone they believe to be a student in the school in the altogether. At this point they stop viewing the images until there is a second person present.

 

2. They contact the Child Protection Officer who comes up to the office (immediately?)

 

3. The CPO and the IT Tech check the actual photos and as soon as they look at it they see that it is one of their students. They stop viewing any more pictures.

 

4. IT Support walk down to the file server and pull the plug as mandated for illegal images of this type. The IT Support team know it is a major issue to pull the plug on the server and the CPO goes with them to inform the head. In the interim they check whose home area they are on and they disable that account (including kicking the user of the system if needed) so the only people who now have access to that area are those with administrative access to the file server. The CPO issues the instruction that all IT Support staff are to log off their computers from that server without accessing any other files immediately. At this point the IT Tech/NM has isolated the original access to the files, limited access to the files by instruction to trusted individuals (ie those who have admin access anyway) but has not changed the permissions or nature of the files.

 

5. Images are also on backup server- repeat step four.

 

6. IT Support ring the Police and report the incident. Discussion takes place between the CPO, the Head, the NM and only a few other key staff about the implication of having to hand over file server, backup server and all tapes.The police are informed of the importance of the server to the normal running of the school and it is in the hands of the police as to what the decision is about they remove the complete server and all backups. As part of this report the police are informed of the identified student and the user whose home area they are in. They will deal with contacting the appropriate parts of social services who will initiate an investigation.

 

7. The investigation has found that Johnny in year eight is going out with Jessica in his form. She let him take some "special" pictures of her.

 

8. Johnny stupidly puts them on his home area.

 

At this point it may be prudent to rapidly leaving the building before the screams of rage from SMT, teachers, students, parents, Govenors and anyone else who cares to involve themselves can be heard.

 

Ignorance it has to be said is bliss.

 

From the training I have had and what I have been told to do the above seems to be a fuller explanation of the scenario but I would be remiss to point out that it may vary from investigation to investigation ... there are no timescales ... and it is also down to the decisions on the day. I will send the scenario over to the local team to see what their point of view would be on it though. I would also like to check what other scenarios they may think we need to cover.

 

I think we have an item to cover at the next Conference and I think it really needs to be delivered by CEOP / Police.

 

Oh ... there is one last thing on all of this ... at this point you might want to start thinking about your disaster recovery / business continuity plan. You do have one don't you?

[Bezwick]

Its not me that does it, so its nothing to do with me, but from what i can gather the head only posts out stuff that is sort of Page 3 standard, the really bad stuff they are called in for. Dont worry. Lol

 

@Beswick @srochfod Nooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Put them in an envelope but do not send them. Invite the parents in and offer them the chance to look at the offensive materials. If you mail them out then you could be at risk of the Obscene Publications Act. *Never* force someone else to look at possibly offensive adult materials.

[PEO]

I have an esafety flow chart that guides IT Managers in situations like this.

 

For us we have an Internet/network infringments folder. When we find material not suitable for school/work we print it out date, sign and inform the esafety coordinator who is also the Deputy Head Teacher.

 

I will dig the flow chart out and post it here. if it is any use to people

[PEO]

Here is the Flowchart for Managing an eSafety Incident.

 

Hope this helps, I will say is I dod not create this. This was given to my line manager from another authority.

 

We are giving this to all staff as a guide so we all follow the same procedure

 

Cheers

 

Kev

Flowchart for Managing an eSafety Incident.doc

[PEO]

Hi here is the origional document for you all to see, its designed for schools to adapt to their own policy.

 

link for information on esafety etc . HGfL: eSafety :Internet Access Policies

 

esafety document http://www.thegrid.org.uk/eservices/safety/documents/csf0137_model_policy_ict_acceptable_use.doc