College Policy on Filtering Websites

duffman90210

Hey

Just wondering if anybody knows the exact TCD college policy on filtering websites. At the moment there would be more internet freedom in North Korea than in the music department's computer lab. It's gotten to the extent that they are a nuisance to use and so much material is blocked that it'd be more convenient to use a cracked version of expensive music software on ones own laptop at home than on the custom built music macs (that our college fees undoubtadely contributed towards) in college.

Any information on this is appreciated!

Groinshot

I've never found anything censored in college. you can do whatever you like as long as it's legal as far as I know.

PurpleFistMixer

Torrentfreak is blocked, I assume other sites are too. Not to mention all the ports, of course.

AndrewJD

I can get on TorrentFreak..? But yeah, for me it's all the ports that they block that cause issues. And whatever it is that stops 80% of flash video players not working.

M450

PurpleFistMixer wrote: »

Torrentfreak is blocked, I assume other sites are too. Not to mention all the ports, of course.

It isn't blocked for me, thepiratebay isn't even blocked.

The only issues I've had in college are with streaming video and of course any p2p program.

ED E

They dont block sites. They do close ports. They also monitor traffic, use P2P and you will get caught.

Steve Higginson

Lethal_Bullet wrote: »

They dont block sites. They do close ports. They also monitor traffic, use P2P and you will get caught.

They do block sites.

The only person I've ever seen "get caught" downloaded about 50 gigs of TV shows over the course of a weekend and all they got was a warning email from ISS telling them about misuse of the college network.

duffman90210

Yeah, but does anybody know the actual college policy on filtering websites? Like I said, the music department has dozens of sites blocked including youtube, facebook, myspace, google images among many more, that make surfing the web a nuisance.

I'd love to challenge the department on it if I knew it was against college policy to filter everyday websites.

ED E

Steve Higginson wrote: »

They do block sites.

The only person I've ever seen "get caught" downloaded about 50 gigs of TV shows over the course of a weekend and all they got was a warning email from ISS telling them about misuse of the college network.

Really, must be a really lax policy, I've never run into a wall.

Saw an email one chap got last week from the ISS, linked back to the specific torrent. Presumably you get a warning the first time, but I'd wager even the ISS would pursue repeat offenders.

Groinshot

Steve Higginson wrote: »

They do block sites.

The only person I've ever seen "get caught" downloaded about 50 gigs of TV shows over the course of a weekend and all they got was a warning email from ISS telling them about misuse of the college network.

Nope, They don't block sites. They block ports as someone else said. Try use... anything... P2P, games, etc, they're all blocked. I'm sure they know exactly what we're all doing, as I said, just as long as it's legal.

PurpleFistMixer

M450 wrote: »

It isn't blocked for me, thepiratebay isn't even blocked.

I'm not aware of any torrent sites being blocked for me actually (tpb is grand), I'm not sure what the deal with torrentfreak is.

Joseph

What about usenet?

goingnowhere

As a matter of policy no websites are blocked.

External access is restricted to ports 80 and 443 via the proxy servers, which naturally record who accessed what and when. This blocks all manner of P2P

In fact the College rules actually don't prohibit you viewing porn, provided that you a) don't do it in a public computer room b) everyone is legal

The only way to get into trouble is to download illegal or copyrighted material and if you do the College will throw you out and hand you over to the Gardai

AndrewJD

goingnowhere wrote: »

College rules actually don't prohibit you viewing porn

Of course not, why else would they need the 24-hour swipe computer rooms?

Mark200

Just on the subject of blocking sites, I've just ran into a blocked website: http://www.iptorrents.com/

Access Denied

Web access has been denied because you are not a member of the appropriate College Network (Active Directory) groups needed to use this proxy system or access has been denied to the resource you requested.

Please ensure that you are using your correct WINDOWS DOMAIN credentials or contact IS services helpdesk quoting the above error message.

goingnowhere

Loads fine for me

tehjimmeh

proxyA blocks some websites proxyB doesn't block and vice-versa.

ED E

Proxy A is on the blink again, and by the sounds of it maybe B too now, though I'm home ATM so I cant tell for sure.

Steve Higginson

Both proxies have been going nuts for the last week. It's unbelievably frustrating to try to do work and have pages load only once every three attempts.

snappieT

goingnowhere wrote: »

As a matter of policy no websites are blocked.

Except that, in practice, they are.

goingnowhere wrote: »

External access is restricted to ports 80 and 443 via the proxy servers [...] This blocks all manner of P2P

This is not the case. With some minor tweaks, I was torrenting in college no bother.

goingnowhere wrote: »

The only way to get into trouble is to download [...] copyrighted material and if you do the College will throw you out and hand you over to the Gardai

Except that copyright law is civil and the Gardaí have absolutely no involvement in it...

Groinshot

tehjimmeh wrote: »

proxyA blocks some websites proxyB doesn't block and vice-versa.

Such as?

snappieT wrote: »

Except that, in practice, they are.

Really? such as?

M450

Groinshot wrote: »

Such as?


Really? such as?

Are you trying to be smart or something?

That iptorrents site linked to earlier is blocked on proxyb but not proxya. There's one example.

Groinshot

M450 wrote: »

Are you trying to be smart or something?

That iptorrents site linked to earlier is blocked on proxyb but not proxya. There's one example.

Nope, I'm nottrying to be smart, I'm looking for examples.

EDIT:
just started my browser, logged into proxyb and can get at said website. could also do it on proxya in IE when I tried too.

AndrewJD

Are people still having problems with the internet right now? It can take 20-30 seconds for a page to even start loading right now with me. I don't want to pester ISS unless it's just my problem.

Mark200

It's going pretty fast for me at the moment, but yesterday it was as slow as you described for me.