New Filter (June 2010)

[Arcath]

Important Notice: The Lancashire Grid for Learning is implementing a new Internet Content Filtering system for all schools from June 2010. As part of the migration to the new system, from Monday 10th May all update requests (blocking* / unblocking of sites) to the existing Smartfilter system will only be actioned between the hours of 1700 & 0800.

 

* Please note: The immediate blocking of sites can continue to be done via the school’s own local caching server (NED).

 

I'd heard some rumours about a change in the system, anyone know anything more about the changes?

 

I like the line at the bottom implying that of the tiny fraction of the internet we are allowed on we'd actually want to block some stuff.

 

Its nice to see the people at the westfield are only going to work outside office hours forcing us to work late or get in early to get things un-blocked.

 

My big question is will we still have to go through a form for review or will we be able to quickly and easily gain access to filtered websites (on the un-catergorized list, not the black list)?

[Geoff]

I noted while at the EduGeek conference at the Woodlands Conference Centre (having not set foot in a Lancashire school lately) that this is now live? How's it going?

[AWicher]

Day one with CLEO Netsweeper. EPIC FAIL (IN MY VIEW) Doing my day to day job all i have had was ether, Page is blocked,Timed out or page is being scanned, and there are only 3 people in school! whats it going to be like when i have 800 people online and every other school on the grid.

 

There is also the small matter of getting websites unblocked. To do so all you need to do is input your email address and a comment... Oh almost forgot, your email password as well (P.S its an unencrypted page )

 

So, what am i looking forward to on Monday i wonder?

 

This does remind me of what some one (No name) was saying when CAPITA SIM.NET guys where taking questions at edugeek2010, its another example of a corporation off loading its responsibilities onto the school.

 

 

 

** These are my personal views and not of my employer! **

[Geoff]

I did note it appear to get 'stuck' scanning pages indefinitely. Have you had feedback from LancsNGFL/Westfield about the issues?

[AWicher]

... Have you had feedback from LancsNGFL/Westfield about the issues?

 

I personally have emailed #westfield with my "Concern" over having to put ones email password in and also the apparent slowdown of the internet as its scans... but with out reply.

 

Now i know for a fact it now cant be out connection which use to be a problem as we have been moved over to the CLEO 100Mb Fiber

 

Someone else complained and got a nice email roughly saying "some key staff can get permission from there head... from 1st July.

 

I think thast the point where we can choose as a school to unblock previously unblockable sites, such as youtube, facebook...

[Ric_]

Other than the 'Geek, I've visited one website so far today and every other page of that site was scanned because it was an unknown URL. Obviously that's better than the old 'uncategorised' problem because I did get to see the pages eventually but the scanning wasn't as quick as the 3-5 seconds mentioned at the meeting last week. Worrying that the message states that it can take up to 10 minutes to scan a page too!!!

[Ric_]

I've also noticed that somebody has taken it upon themselves to filter advertising on websites... great for those organisations that require advertising revenue to pay for the services offered to their members.

[SimpleSi]

IMHO the main problem is that the county corporate centre basically just want to tick boxes to say they've done their job and then go home

 

And because they are just an amorphous cloud, you can't get anyone to actually take responsibility and get things sorted, and even if there were trying to sort things - you wouldn't be able to find out

 

It makes me weep.

 

The password thing is just B&*^%y stupid - how would Lancs know a high schools internal email password?

 

I'm just going to create an email address (On the Lancs email system) for each of my schools.

 

Suggestions please as to what name to use before the @school.lancs.sch.uk

 

No Fs please

 

Simon

[Ric_]

The password thing is just B&*^%y stupid - how would Lancs know a high schools internal email password?

 

I just get a mailto link so they've either changed that page or different schools get different pages depending upon their email provider.

[SimpleSi]

You can't make this stuff up!

I've popped in to my local school (for local people) and this is what I got on my very first search after I clicked on the link

 

(It was for Helium Frog - a stop-mo animation software)

 

I personally had this site whitelisted 2 months ago so that means they've completely ignored the whitelist that we've all spent 2 years building up.

 

There is no icon to represent my emotions :(

 

Simon

[SimpleSi]

mm- it works now - is someone from the cloud listening

 

Simon

[SimpleSi]

And if so - you need to block the search phrase "pink skin"

 

For the sake of balance ( ) - I like the fact that google searches are re-wriiten as safe and that I can't save changes to my prefs

 

regards

 

Simon

[SimpleSi]

I've also noticed that somebody has taken it upon themselves to filter advertising on websites... great for those organisations that require advertising revenue to pay for the services offered to their members.

 

I just get the normal

Prefetching is not allowed due to the various privacy issues that arise.

 

when I click on the first offered Edugeek link

 

But it used to do that anyway

 

Simon

[AWicher]

Its seems quite simple. We are all having to cost cut (Smaller budget...) seems they have done the same!

 

Its was out to tender, they got a cheaper option and have off loaded the responsibility of the filtering onto the school. Now its not a bad idea in some cases, some school might want youtube, facebook, twitter... unblocking and others would not dream of doing that, but what will happen to primary schools.

 

As part of my high school role was to visit local primary's and deal with there IT problems and i know (Not to put them down) they would find it so very difficult to manage there own filtering.

 

Now it could be the case that westfield/CLEO/LGFL or whoever will deal with them on a one to one, but that has never been said, unless we have missed an email or two in my school that explained this new filter i feel left in the dark.

[Ric_]

I don't think that there was much of a consiltation process but we all knew that the SmartFilter solution had to go. With CLEO wanting to become a Becta Accredited ISP (although now a moot point) there was other hoops that had to be jumped through. I don't think it's down to cost.

 

The current service is meant to be like-for-like (although it obviously isn't) and there probably will be teething problems. I'm sure some of our findings are also down to 'taste' and personal opinion... I'd rather just have every page's content examined rather than use what is escentially a URL filter and a fancy engine for adding new sites to the URL lists. I'll probably be happier once we're given the freedom to open up more of the web and then I'll use a local solution to fine tune.

 

@AWicher: The decision to block and unblock things will be left down to the schools with a default level of filtering applied so primaries that don't want to manage their own filtering should be fine. I do agree with your comment that there has been a lack of communication regarding the purchasing process and it would have been nice for all schools to have been given the chance to give input in the process - web filteringhas a pretty massive effect on schools after all!

[SimpleSi]

unless we have missed an email or two in my school that explained this new filter

 

All info is on the portal (or that's what they'll say when asked )

 

Unfortunately - there seem to be a number of people VERY unwilling (or not allowed by someone else) to provide timely information to us.

 

A simple website that we could monitor for changes would do the job but that seems to be beyond their ability to organise

 

regards

Simon

[Ric_]

A simple website that we could monitor for changes would do the job but that seems to be beyond their ability to organise

 

I did suggest this some time ago and even recommended a site where there's already a forum for CLEO discussions. Now what was the name of that site

[schoolsupport]

Hi

Can I just ask that if you are experiencing problems with the filtering please can you let us know the specific details so that we can try to address them ideally before schools come back.

 

The switch to a new system is a major change and there are differences between the two systems which whilst we have tested the software with pilot schools it is very difficult to pick up all the issues that such a major change involves on this scale.

 

At the moment we are bringing things in on a phased basis, with the aim being that you get a similar level of access as you had before under smart filter but will then bring in new features later on.

With respect to primary school filtering we are not going to forcing schools manage their own filtering, they will still be filtered by a default filtering policy that has been tailored for primary schools. What we will be doing is offering those primary schools that would like the option to have a bit more control over the filtering the capacity to do that.

 

Also can I clarify that we did not switch the filtering as a cost cutting exercise it was done as our existing filtering license was due to expire and we had to go out and look at the options that were available and Netsweeper best met our requirements.

 

With respect to the existing white lists we have compared the white lists in Smartfilter against how Netsweeper categorizes sites and have added the lists in. However since we have done that comparison additional sites have been white listed and so some of these may have been missed, please can you let us know about them and we will see if we can get them added back in.

 

Can I just add that the new filtering should ultimately provide you with much more flexibility for those who want it as you will have a lot more local control over what you get access to. It should ultimately speed things up as websites will be categorized automatically.

 

Please bear with us to whilst we work towards making the switch as painless as possible.

 

PS We will investigate the issues with the speed of scanning of the websites

 

Thanks

 

 

Martin

[Arcath]

I assume that the Time Outs are not the websites but the net sweeper bieng made to scan every other web page someone accesses?

 

One feature that needs to be setup which can be achived through a little bit of JS is putting the original url back into the address bar! its a pain having to type the url in again, if it was put back into the address bar f6 then enter would resend the request

[jhothersall]

I've logged it but google cache is working :-/ Example

[ChrisH]

I have just queried the fact that they are asking for a password on the unblock form. I assume it is the users email password but we have our own exchange server and not the county hosted services.

[AWicher]

We have just issued a memo to staff not use that service but to email us with the URL and we will forward to westfield.

[ChrisH]

We did the same this morning. They are currently looking into it.

[soveryapt]

I love the fact that there are links from the LancsNGFL website (NCSL specifically) that had their login page blocked as it was https, but you didn't get any "unblock this page" text, it was just blocked, so emailed them on the filter@ address to get it resolved, which ok, they have done pretty quickly, but if they are managing to block sites they recommend, I hate to think what is going to happen..

 

I think it's a case of ride the storm and see if it settles. I agree that it is a good thing they are putting more control into our hands, as there are certain aspects of the various sites (YouTube, etc) that are useful for Educational purposes, but I guess it depends on how hard it is to manage and how much extra workload it's going to involve, and whether it will be a default set of rules, but you can set a whitelist for the school that over-rules them, therefore you get additional protection of CLEO blocking the nasty sites, or if we choose to self manage, are we then wholeheartedly responsible for the content that comes to the school?

 

I know we all got warning of the changeover taking place last Wednesday via the Schools Portal the week prior, but it would be nice to have a little more information to go with all that too, but hopefully that will be coming.

[Geoff]

If we choose to self manage, are we then wholeheartedly responsible for the content that comes to the school?

 

That's note quite how it works. If you get pulled up for some reason for its always the schools fault. Regardless of if you are using an in-house filter, or your RBCs. RBCs wipe their hands clean of anything being their fault in that contract you signed....