Limiting Employees Internet Access, Whats the best solution? Options

[jason_sot]

In the most layman's terms possible, what is the best/easiest/cheapest way to limit employees access to the internet?

Ideally, I would like to only allow them access TO certain sites, rather than restricting them FROM certain sites.

Any ideas?

[Respree]

Not endorsing this particular product, but it seems like something similar to this might be the answer to your problem.
http://www.cyberwebpro.com/browse_control/...se-control.html

[jason_sot]

Thanks Respree... I had come across that as well. Any personal experience with it?

**EDIT: Scratch that... I hadnt seen this one. This one is FREE Cant complain about that. I'll give it a shot!

**EDIT AGAIN: Scratch that again... it is just a free trial. but the pricing isnt too bad. I just dont know yet if i can WHITELIST rather than having to BLACKLIST

This post has been edited by jason_sot: Mar 12 2008, 05:57 PM

[laurad]

What type of office or shop do you have setup? Do you have an IT guy there that can help you with this or are you the IT guy? Some companies only allow net access to their "intranet", some only for certain sites, etc.

[bobbb]

A firewall/router in deny mode will block anything and everything. Unfortunately most routers today like Linksys or D-link are made for home use and are in default allow mode from the inside.

I checked the software above. The client has to be installed on each PC. A boot CD can easily defeat this.

There are a number of FREE solutions but all require some sort of IT guy to install and manage. Manage is really the greater challenge in a project like this even with the software above. This IT guy does not have to be a propeller head or guru but just needs some basic knowledge of networking stuff.

I moderate on another forum that does just that (firewall/router). It is not really that hard.
I'm not plugging unless you really want to know.

This post has been edited by bobbb: Apr 9 2008, 04:03 PM

[Thejspot]

Uh......*cough*....... you don't trust your employees?

If my boss came to me and said, "ok, I'm only going to give you access to certain sites on the net", without knowing too much about your situation, I would consider it a bad move.

I would point out the following to him.

1. Bad PR for you as a boss.
2. Instead of staying at work in my lunch break and continuing to answer phones etc, I'll be in the queue at the bank, or wherever else I used to have access to on the internet that you have now blocked.
3. If I'm strapped for ideas you're going to remove my ability to research or be inspired?
4. Regardless of how you package this or frame it, this action says "I don't trust you". Especially if I haven't given you any reason not to, I'm now resenting you and you won't get my best.