Re: Content blocking - Singapore seems to manage??

[Crispin Cowan <crispin () cse ogi edu>]

Alan Lustiger wrote:

> This was an effective deterrent in one place I worked, but it is not the most scalable solution....
>
> Client machines were named in such a way that it was obvious who owned each machine.
>
> The proxy logs were available to all.
>
> An announcement went out that everyone can see where everyone else is surfing, and the URL
> of the proxy logs was given to all.
>
> The drop-off of inappropriate surfing was astonishing...:-)

Problem with this approach:  HTML-aware mail clients and spam.

I frequently get porno spam.  The spam often is in the form of an HTML document, which naturally
hyper-links to graphics on the porno site.  This would cause my machine to appear to be surfing
inappropriate sites, just because I opened some junk mail.  Not clicked on the links, just opened the
mail.

Observation:  a proxy log showing hits to an inappropriate site is NOT prima facie evidence of
inappropriate surfing, unless the proxy is smart enough to distinguish loading an HTML e-mail from
proactive surfing.

Crispin
-----
 Crispin Cowan, Research Assistant Professor of Computer Science, OGI
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