synaesthesia

Again though, why would anyone other than SLT and specifically the DSL need access? I don't know this for sure (so open question), in the case of a possible safeguarding issue concerning your head teacher's internet use, the DSL would be first point of contact anyway?

I'm still unclear, as you've now added a 3rd "option". We were told originally that Cloud Reporting would make it easier for our DSLs , however in practice and from a support call with SW it was apparent it only works for Smoothwall Cloud devices (i.e. chromebooks) and not on-site devices. I haven't heard about it taking over the on-site (it definitely doesn't but then again may be related to the issues I've mentioned) For 1) though, there should never be any reason any member of staff other than DSL would need to run such a report, that isn't anyone's job other than the DSL or their deputies. Here it's just me, DSL and DDSL, both of whom are SLT.

For us at least just putting the block in for www.youtube.com has worked, and we also have *youtube* in the caption detection and that seemed to catch everything properly the last couple of lessons yesterday. It's a pain as it's one of those sites that can very often be needed at short notice, otherwise I'd have just put it in Smoothwall, but being able to allow/deny it at a moment's notice (or when someone is messing around) via Impero is a huge time saver. I'll be keeping a close eye on Monday anyway and will update if anything changes

yeah, for now I've fallen back to a block on *youtube* in the window caption for now. Smoothwall thankfully is good enough to just handle it as a category so we can block for KS3 - I only kept it in Impero as it was easier to lift that restriction if a lesson needed it.

Cheers Tom

Smoothwall confirms, at least for us that logging into Google now means it hits https://accounts.youtube.com/accounts/CheckConnection?pmpo=https%3A%2F%2Faccounts.google.com&v=...... I'll therefore need to tweak our policies to allow the above but block the actual video site.

Morning, Just wondering if anyone else has noticed a problem recently referring to Google accounts logins? Since yesterday, all our students were having Impero close their browsers when they tried to log into their Google account, with the reason "access to youtube.com". They were just going to gmail.com or even accounts.google.com to sign in. This didn't appear correct, so have just got off a Zoom call with Impero support who had seen this come up elsewhere recently and may be pertinent to how you block access to YouTube. It may also have an effect when filtering with other products such as Smoothwall. I had hunted around the google login page's source to spot any reference to youtube with no luck, but Impero directed me to the Website Visited log and it showed this! I'm just checking our Smoothwall now, but it might be worth a check over if you've had similar issues when limiting access to Youtube.

Just asked our AV supplier if they could get hold of any older units for this reason - they've come straight back to me to say that all their bundles come with the OPS-A2 unit for this exact reason. Could be a potential life saver!

Argh, that's a pain - just looking to order a pair of these. It's all well and good promoting their own software but it's *FAR* better IMO to be as agnostic as possible. I want someone to be able to come in with an apple scrapbook, chromebook, Toshiba Libretto or anything else and still have the same experience as everyone else. If we go down the route of changing it out, we're much, much better off saving a grand and getting a pair of Viewsonics instead. Thanks for this thread, very well timed!

Could be worth opening a call with them, they managed to hop onto ours within a couple of hours of logging so was quite impressed with their support (see my edit on last post)

I don't recall there being any specific config other than the bookmark - are you sure it's in managed bookmarks rather than the toolbar? I did have an issue at the start of last term which Impero looked at for me, they needed to do a repair installation of our impero server - didn't take long to do and the chromebooks instantly started reconnecting. The troubleshooting he did beforehand did just involve checking the managed bookmark and the version (v8.6.34)

Hi all, I'm just going through our safeguarding software with a fine toothed comb, and just thought of something. Is there any benefit to having the smoothwall native client & browser extension installed on domain joined machines? Obviously they're already protected by our on-site appliance, and the only thing I can think of is if devices go off site. In our case that'd only relate to staff devices. Would it provide any benefit or would it just be overcomplicating? I'm all for having a backstop in case one system fails or has a glitch, so if it's going to give us a little more peace of mind then I'm all for it Cheers

Got it I think! The extension you have, and likewise me is for ChromeOS only. For Windows it's jmbpophoikplmainbalhodlgkkmogkmp

Sorry it took so long to get back - Windows/Smoothwall was doing it's "Nooo, you're logged in as Administrator therefore you're not going to be filtered properly and Edugeek is baaaad" thing. MV3 is working fine on our Chromebooks but I get the same as you on the Windows devices (on Chrome at least). Edge works fine! Digging further into it now though.

Might you need to remove the old extension beforehand? (block it via GPO) I just checked our GPO to see what we did, and realised I haven't even pushed this extension out to anything except our Chromebooks! Makes sense why every blocked page closes the whole browser window now as it's just relying on the client app. I'll push this to a few windows devices and see how it behaves and report back.

Exactly, feels like whatever we do it's cheating something, but if we're being cheated ourselves it softens the blow a bit. Not sure a financial auditor would agree however so there's an element of protecting ourselves too. These things are supposed to help us and keep things fair, yet clearly isn't always the case. Framework purchasing is usually a good way around it anyway, but that's something your school/LEA/trust would be aware of already, so they certainly shouldn't be questioning procedure and demanding extra quotes!

Chrome stopped supporting MV2 extensions so depending on version it won't work any more, you need to use the MV3 extension which I believe is lpkffpnklfdjompeeodhpaeenfdpibmj

Biggest differences are behind the scenes. I'd say a secondary school using Google primarily *must* have it if only to enable proper auditing and security, as the free version is, IMHO, too lax and reporting is poor. There's apparently some teaching/classroom related benefits but unfortunately I don't know what they are in real terms.

Can you do any rate limiting per IP on your firewall/filter? (Haven't used surfprotect in anger so unsure if it's possible)

Fine for us on both here

Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh. That'll be a trip to the cinema. A particularly comfortable one, new Cineworld I suspect

Interesting - I've suspected drivers/software handling has been at play for a number of years, as it was even reproducible across device brands with certain chipsets (but not limited to one particular type). Seemed bonkers that buying EDID emulators was literally the easiest way of working around the issue because trying to enforce resolutions & refresh rates on devices that move from board to board with 2 screens is just pointless. Fingers crossed something comes of this then! Windows 11 (well, any Windows update really) does seem to introduce a few more quirks - WiFi signal strength on W11 devices is diabolical compared to the same device on Windows 10.

Yeah, hopefully it's that simple - Impero is less likely to be a problem as it wouldn't (or shouldn't) be anyone's sole method of safeguarding compliance, however it may raise concern over software which might - senso, securely etc.

"You'd like us to remove or disable software which either wholly or partly protects our students and indeed the school as part of our KCSIE obligations?" My answer would be immediately no, fix your software or provide alternative means, Safeguarding trumps your poor efforts at educational software regardless of the fact it may be for assessments.

We use them (until next year) with our phone system, support has always been brilliant. Only moving away due to going with a trust led provider, the only thing I would change is the system we have (splicecom) but that's not a problem with their supply