Re: Family protection - proxy?

[Anthony J Placilla <anthony_placilla () suth com>]

On Thu, 2006-03-30 at 04:36 -0500, Paul Simons wrote:
> I am looking for advice on how I can best protect my family from the
> 'horrors' on the Internet.
> We have a small ADSL/wireless network at home (with a firewall and AV
> on
> all systems) on which my kids have their PCs/Macs. My wife and I use
> it
> via our laptops.
>
> What is the best way of stopping access to porn/violence/etc.?
>
> I was looking at setting up a system with a proxy. Or maybe paying for
> some sort of service?
> I don't really want to have to install a package on every system
> (expensive and unmanageable)
> Any other suggestions gratefully considered
>
> Paul
I've done exactly this for several friends and non-profits I volunteer
for.

Obviously nothing is 100% perfect but what seems to work the best is
getting and older box like a PII with a decent amount of RAM (256 or
better) and a 20Gb disk. You can find these for the taking all over the
place. Stick 2 NICs in it

Install IPCop (http://ipcop.org/) 

Then install the add-on component
(http://firewalladdons.sourceforge.net/)

Once that is on the box install the Cop+ add-on
(http://firewalladdons.sourceforge.net/cop.html)

Dan's Guardian with a very easy front end, automatic black-list
downloads & very granular configuration tools. Showing the "offender" a
log entry of a block works every time if you need to concern yourself
with behavior modification.

The nice feature is that the add-on server will allow you add or remove
different modules that will enhance the firewall (time based allow/deny
access, spam & virus mail proxy, etc.) 



-- 
Tony Placilla, RHCT
anthony_placilla () suth com


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