Security Services > Content Filter
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SonicOS Enhanced 4.0 Administrator Guide
SonicWALL Content Filtering Service
SonicWALL Content Filtering Service (CFS) enforces protection and productivity policies for
businesses, schools and libraries to reduce legal and privacy risks while minimizing
administration overhead. SonicWALL CFS utilizes a dynamic database of millions of URLs, IP
addresses and domains to block objectionable, inappropriate or unproductive Web content. At
the core of SonicWALL CFS is an innovative rating architecture that cross references all Web
sites against the database at worldwide SonicWALL co-location facilities. A rating is returned
to the SonicWALL security appliance and then compared to the content filtering policy
established by the administrator. Almost instantaneously, the Web site request is either allowed
through or a Web page is generated by the SonicWALL security appliance informing the user
that the site has been blocked according to policy.
With SonicWALL CFS, network administrators have a flexible tool to provide comprehensive
filtering based on keywords, time of day, trusted and forbidden domain designations, and file
types such as Cookies, Java™ and ActiveX® for privacy. SonicWALL CFS automatically
updates the filters, making maintenance substantially simpler and less time consuming.
SonicWALL CFS can also be customized to add or remove specific URLs from the blocked list
and to block specific keywords. When a user attempts to access a site that is blocked by the
SonicWALL security appliance, a customized message is displayed on the user’s screen.
SonicWALL security appliance can also be configured to log attempts to access sites on the
SonicWALL Content Filtering Service database, on a custom URL list, and on a keyword list to
monitor Internet usage before putting new usage restrictions in place.
• SonicWALL CFS Standard blocks 12 categories of objectionable, inappropriate or
unproductive Web content. SonicWALL CFS Standard runs on SonicOS Standard 2.0 (or
higher).
• SonicWALL CFS Premium blocks 56 categories of objectionable, inappropriate or
unproductive Web content. SonicWALL CFS Premium provides network administrators with
greater control by automatically and transparently enforces acceptable use policies. It gives
administrators the flexibility to enforce custom content filtering policies for groups of users
on the network. For example, a school can create one policy for teachers and another for
students. SonicWALL CFS Premium Productivity Edition and the SonicWALL CFS
Premium Government/Education Edition run on SonicOS Standard 2.1 (or higher) as well
as SonicOS Enhanced 2.0 (or higher).
Note For complete SonicWALL Content Filtering Service documentation, see the SonicWALL
Content Filtering Service Administrator’s Guide available at http://www.sonicwall.com/us/
Support.html
Content Filter Status
If SonicWALL CFS is activated, the Content Filter Status section displays the status of the
Content Filter Server, as well as the date and time that your subscription expires. The expiration
date and time is displayed in Universal Time Code (UTC) format.