Monitor vs. filter vs. warn

[hyman at sjrlc.org]

Karen,

This is one that I've been talking about for a while. By using a product
that will produce a report of sites accessed and sites attempted and
denied, the library can get a pretty good idea of what's happening with a
filter, even in the absense of the "secret list of sites". While you
couldn't see the full list of blocked sites, you could see what had been
blocked in your library.  The WebSense marketing guy told me last Spring
that their product could produce both reports, but I never saw it myself
since I don't have a WINDOWS NT Server. Can WebSense do it?

Are you still sending the To Filter or Not to Filter chapter? KH 

On Tue, 2 Sep 1997, Karen G. Schneider wrote:

> Two of the software capabilities I discuss in my forthcoming book, now in
> its first rough draft and being shaped up quickly, are monitor-vs.-filter,
> and warn-vs.-filter.  There are several software programs available which
> are intended to do nothing except monitor and report on "what's happening,"
>  and several filters offer this capability, as well.  Several vendors
> encourage people to do just that before implementing any filtering. The
> vendors often talk about this feature as if it were useful for seeing what
> users are doing, but of course, it is also useful for seeing what the
> *company* is doing, since site lists can't be viewed in nearly all
> products. Additionally, a number of products either will support
> warn-vs.-block very soon, or would if there were demand to do so.  This
> would allow authorized users to override a warning message.  Finally, you
> can expect to see more configurability at the client and user level.
> 
> The decision whether or not to use a filter should be made with as much
> information as possible.  Rhetoric is not where the rubber meets the ramp.
> 
> 
> ______________________________________________
> Karen G. Schneider |  kgs at bluehighways.com
> Director, US EPA Region 2 Library  |  Contractor, GCI
> Councilor-at-Large, American Library Association
> The Internet Filter Assessment Project:   
>  http://www.bluehighways.com/tifap/
> Author, Forthcoming: A Practical Guide to Internet Filters
> (Neal Schuman, 1997)
> Information is hard work  -------------------------------------------
>