Educational institutions, businesses and government agencies assume substantial risks when they provide students and employees IT-issued computers that can be used to access the Internet, even when the device is behind the firewall perimeter where organizational web use policies are enforced. This is particularly true when those connections are used to access sites containing information or images that are inappropriate, dangerous or even illegal. These sites may also be infected with malware that can be inadvertently downloaded and then used to steal confidential information.

Schools, in particular, have a responsibility to protect students from inappropriate and harmful web content. In addition, to receive eRate funding, both schools and libraries are required by law to install a content filtering solution in compliance with the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA). For businesses and government agencies, providing employees with uncontrolled web access can result in non-productive web surfing, creating tremendous losses in productivity, not to mention the potential for legal liability.

Highlights

• Best in-class protection
• Granular content filtering controls
• Dynamically updated rating architecture
• Application traffic analytics
• Easy-to-use web-based management
• High-performance web caching and rating architecture
• IP-based HTTPS content filtering
• Scalable, cost-effective solution
• Content Filtering Client for roaming devices

Features & Benefits:

• Granular content filtering allows the administrator to block or apply bandwidth management to all predefined categories or any combination of categories. Administrators can apply User Level Authentication (ULA) and Single Sign-On (SSO) to enforce username and password logon. CFS can block potentially harmful content such as Java, ActiveX, and Cookies, as well as schedule filtering by time of day, such as during school or business hours. CFS also enhances performance by filtering out IM, MP3s, streaming media, freeware and other files that drain bandwidth.
• Dynamically updated rating architecture cross-references all requested web sites against a highly accurate database categorizing millions of URLs, IP addresses and domains. The SonicWALL firewall receives ratings in real time, and then compares each rating to the local policy setting. The appliance will then either allow or deny the request based on the administrator’s locally configured policy.
• Application traffic analytics suite includes SonicWALL Global Management System (GMS), SonicWALL Analyzer and SonicWALL Scrutinizer, each of which provides real-time and historic analysis of data transmitted through the firewall, including web sites blocked and visited by user.
• Easy-to-use web-based management enables flexible policy configuration and complete control over Internet usage. Administrators can enforce multiple custom policies for individual users, groups or specific category types. Local URL filtering controls can allow or deny specific domains or hosts. To block objectionable and unproductive material more effectively, administrators can also create or customize filtering lists.
• High-performance web caching and rating architecture allows administrators to block sites easily and automatically by category. URL ratings are cached locally on the SonicWALL firewall, so that response time for subsequent access of frequently visited sites is only a fraction of a second.
• IP-based HTTPS content filtering allows administrators to control user access to web sites over encrypted HTTPS. HTTPS filtering is based on the categorical rating of web sites containing information or images that are objectionable or unproductive such as violence, hate, online banking, shopping and others.
• Scalable, cost-effective solution controls content filtering from the SonicWALL firewall, eliminating the need for additional hardware or deployment expenditures on a separate dedicated filtering server.
• Content Filtering Client for roaming devices extends enforcement of internal web use policies to block objectionable and unproductive Internet content for devices located outside the firewall perimeter. The client enforces security and productivity policies whenever the device connects to the Internet regardless of where the connection is established.