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Blocking vs. Word Filtering:
What you need to know.
In order to sell you their 1995 technology, many word filter companies mislead potential
buyers with promises of "technology," "fast," "no delays," and "new." The truth is very
different.
Some even incorporate small libraries of URLs that are blocked in order to assert that
they have Direct Address Blocking (DAB). Some claim to be able to use "third party
lists." Question is, Who distributes "third party lists"?
Some say they'll allow you to add to the small included library of Direct Address Blocking
(DAB) sites in their word filter programs. Do you have time to research and enter the
300-500 estimated new offensive and pornographic sites that are added to the Internet
every day? Remember, many of these are the new porn sites that turn up in the search
engines, the first ones accessed by your children or your employees!
Blocking
Direct Address Blocking (DAB) from X-Stop, the product using high technology as a
solution, blocks with a keyboard trap, almost instantaneously.
Here's what DAB has to do:
1.User requests a URL through a browser
2.Before the computer even gets the keystrokes, the URL is translated
(if necessary) and compared to the URL list. Because this is done
with numbers instead of letters (there are only 10 digits! There are
255 characters...) the response is nearly instantaneous. If the site is
on the blocked list, the screen is covered, and the violation message
is displayed.
A site not on the list IS NEVER BLOCKED!
What about our list? Our proprietary automated MudCrawler searches out pornography
and other types of sites on the Internet using 44 criteria that we have found to reveal
almost all such sites. Those sites not fitting perfectly are viewed by our "MudCrawler"
technicians for a final decision. Only by automation can the entire Internet be scanned for
URL list block. And only X-Stop has the technology to do it.
Filtering
Word filters slow the computer, block a new "surprise site" every day
Here's what a word filter MUST do:
1.User requests a URL through a browser
2.DELAY while remote URL is accessed by system. You'll see "Looking up host"
then "Host www.anysite.com contacted, waiting for reply," then the "wait" icon
while the site loads into the browser's computer.
3.DELAY while each and every word from remote Web page is compared against
each and every word in the filter list. It's true that computers can do this type of
thing quickly, but there's a wait.
4.If a prohibited word is found, the site is blocked.
The problem is...the blocked site may be a GOOD site! Typical good sites blocked by
word filters include chicken recipe sites, blocked for the word "BREAST," The White
House Web site, blocked for the word "COUPLE," and a county government site blocked
for the word "MiddleSEX" County! There are thousands more great sites that are
"accidentally" blocked by the word filters.
The word filter will frequently allow a picture from a XXX site to appear in the browser
before triggering a block! Many porn sites will purposely make all the "words" in the
opening page into GRAPHICS in order to defeat the word filters. It works! And, of course,
once a picture is on the computer screen it can be saved, printed, e-mailed, or posted to
a newsgroup.
Bottom Line:
X-Stop gives you the degree of accuracy and protection you're looking for!
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