[WEB4LIB] managed collection of sites

[Bill Teschek]

Robin,
   I don't think a technological fix is necessary. A "couple of kids 
accessing porn sites" is not a major problem. It can be dealt with by 
simple disciplinary measures (kick 'em out, don't let them use the 
computers for x number of days, etc.). Treat it as a behavior 
problem no different from kids behaving badly in other ways. We've 
done that at our library and any problems that do occur don't happen 
again more than a time or two.

One minor technological fix I've used is a free pop-up ad killer called 
POW from analogx.com. You build a "kill list" of ads or websites that 
you don't want to open. Trying to open them just causes the window 
to flash open quickly then go right away. If your teens have found a 
favorite porn site that they like to access, add it to the kill list and 
they won't be able to get at it any more.

Bill Teschek
Assistant Director
Lane Memorial Library
Hampton, NH

> Recently we had issues with a couple of kids accessing porn sites on 
> machines in the Youth Services Dept. (Ah, sweet innocent youth! :)) Our YS 
> Librarians decided that they wanted to go to a managed collection of URLs. 
> They identified about 1200 sites they want to include.
> 
> We are running Win2K Server and Win2K Pro on all workstations. They all log 
> in to the server to validate. We are using Active Directory and Win2K group 
> policies for security. We also run PWB v. 1.26 so the browser is presented 
> in kiosk mode - no URL bar.
> 
> I attempted to implement a bogus proxy approach: In the security policy for 
> the YS Internet account we identified a text file which listed all the 
> approved sites. If we try to go to a site which is not in the approved list 
> we get a warning message and are blocked from continuing. So far, so good: 
> however the problem is that we get the same message when we try to go to 
> some of the approved sites (and in these cases some pages on the site may 
> load while others won't, or sometimes a whole site is blocked, even though 
> it's on the list.) As far as I can tell, it's because a problem site is 
> calling material from another site that's not on the list. Some examples 
> I've identified are: When there is an ad banner running on an approved site 
> that links to an advertising site, or when there is a script running on a 
> site that seems to call content from a remote site.
> 
> We have discussed three possible options:
> 1. Trying to identify, approve and add all the secondary sites that are 
> being called and adding them to the approved list. This would be time and 
> labor intensive, plus I fear it could quickly become a long-term 
> maintenance nightmare trying to keep up with changes made by site operators.
> 2. Removing all sites which call material from secondary sites (the easiest 
> and quickest way, but it would leave us with a  sadly depleted collection, 
> and would eliminate many of the best of the sites chosen.
> 3. Using WebSense to block categories. This option is available to us but 
> we spent a couple of hours looking at it yesterday and we are not happy 
> with the choices we would have to make - some categories we would have to 
> block are so broad as to exclude material we feel should be available.
> 
> As I said, I feel there may be no better solution than one of these three, 
> but if there is one I think it will be someone on this list that has it. I 
> would be grateful for suggestions, examples of how you might have dealt 
> with a similar situation, or anything you feel might be helpful.
> 
> TIA for your assistance,
> Robin.
> 
> ______________________________________________________
> Robin 
> Boulton 
> rboulton at linc.lib.il.us
> IT 
> Manager                                                              (630) 
> 584 0076 x 258
> St. Charles Public Library District                         Cell:  (630) 
> 918 8738
> St. Charles, IL 60174                                             FAX: 
> (630) 584 3448
>                          http://www.st-charles.lib.il.us
> ______________________________________________________
> 
> 
> 
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Bill Teschek
bteschek at hampton.lib.nh.us