- What are the key functions of the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
- How does the Barracuda Web Filtering Service block Web sites?
- Can the Barracuda Web Filtering Service block different sites for different users?
- How do I connect to the service and ensure my users are authenticated?
- Can legitimate Web sites be blocked? How do you handle this?
- What is spyware?
- Should I deploy desktop anti-spyware tools even if I have a Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
- What happens to laptops that my employees sometimes use to work remotely? How are they protected?
- Which ports does the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
- How does the administrator interact with the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
- How do I get an online demonstration of the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
- What do I do if I have more questions?
What are the key functions of the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service is a cloud-based secure Web gateway that protects users from malware, phishing, identity theft, and other harmful activity online. Additionally, the service enforces organizational Internet usage policies through content filtering, URL filtering and application blocking. It is centrally managed with real-time consolidated reporting and provides proactive defenses against a quickly evolving threat landscape. Enterprises simply point their Web traffic to the service, and it protects users online regardless of location or physical device, including laptops and mobile devices.
How does the Barracuda Web Filtering Service block Web sites?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service includes 67 categories and 7 super-categories of Web sites that are updated regularly. These categories include Web sites known to include spyware, pornography, and other offensive materials. Additionally, the service performs real-time page content analysis and reputation scoring to accurately determine what exactly is happening on the page at that exact moment. This is increasingly important as more and more legitimate Web sites are compromised with malicious content.
Can the Barracuda Web Filtering Service block different sites for different users?
Yes, the Barracuda Web Filtering Service enables administrators to customize policies for specific users, groups, and IP address ranges in the organization. Administrators also can establish usage thresholds by schedule, bandwidth, requests or browsing time.
Sample uses for these capabilities include:
- Restricting access to job board Web sites to only the Human Resources group
- Defining separate policies for teachers and students at a school
- Enabling compliance officers unrestricted access to the Web for investigation
- Providing external instant messaging (e.g., AIM) access only to specific users or groups
- Restricting personal Web browsing to non-working hours
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service integrates with popular LDAP compatible directory servers to facilitate transparent user authentication.
How do I connect to the service and ensure my users are authenticated?
There are three ways to connect to the Barracuda Web Filtering Service:
- Direct to Service: The easiest way to use the Barracuda Web Filtering Service is to directly proxy your Web traffic to the cloud-based content filtering and malware protection service. This can be done with browser proxy settings or by transparently forwarding traffic from any network firewall or proxy that supports forwarding to an upstream proxy.
- Adapter: The Barracuda Adapter is an on-premise solution that forwards Web traffic to the Barracuda Web Filtering Service, integrates with your directory service for group-based policies, and caches static Web content locally to save bandwidth. The Barracuda Adapter is available as a hardware appliance, a virtual appliance or as a plug-in to your Microsoft ISA Server.
- Web Security Agent: The Barracuda Web Security Agent protects remote and roaming users by enforcing all Web traffic from laptops through the Barracuda Web Filtering Service. The Barracuda Web Security Agent is a lightweight, tamper-proof client available for Microsoft Windows laptops and desktops.
Can legitimate Web sites be blocked? How do you handle this?
Yes, policies can be set down to the user level to block specific Web sites. The Barracuda Web Filtering Service can be configured to allow password-override for certain employees or groups as needed.
What is spyware?
Spyware poses tremendous security threats to organizations, including intellectual property theft, productivity loss, and privacy invasion. As such, Barracuda Networks broadly defines spyware as any software that when installed on your computer either delivers or communicates information without your knowledge or intention outside your computer. This is a very broad definition of spyware, but one that we believe, given the current plethora of problems with spyware, is necessary. This definition includes all malware, adware, keyloggers, toolbars, and many other categories of programs.
Should I deploy desktop anti-spyware tools even if I have a Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service is an effective cloud-based gateway solution to act as a primary line of Web threat defense but it is generally beneficial to layer security solutions. This is particularly useful in cases where spyware threats infiltrate through means other than the Web, including via laptops, USB keys, CD-ROMs, or floppy discs.
What happens to laptops that my employees sometimes use to work remotely? How are they protected?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service protects users online no matter where they are accessing the Web, including laptops and mobile devices. The Barracuda Web Security Agent is a tamper-proof client that enforces access through the service to ensure policies are enforced and malicious content is avoided.
Which ports does the Barracuda Web Filtering Service filter?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service Filter scans and filters port 80 (Web) for content filtering, spyware blocking, and virus blocking.
How does the administrator interact with the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
The Barracuda Web Filtering Service has a Web-based interface for ease of use. In addition administrators can choose to receive system status information and reports via email.
How do I get an online demonstration of the Barracuda Web Filtering Service?
Call us at +1 408-342-5400 to obtain a demonstration of the Barracuda Web Filtering Service.
What do I do if I have more questions?
For answers to more technical questions please visit our technical forum or contact your Barracuda Networks sales representative at 888-ANTI-SPAM or +1 408-342-5400.
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We have a very succinct requirement from the state to block all pornography and gambling on the Internet. This means on handhelds too," said Steven Ferguson, senior network engineer at the Technical College System of Georgia. “We route all Web traffic from the BlackBerry devices through the Purewire proxy server to ensure they aren't looking at inappropriate content or accessing malware-laden sites. This allows us to show government agency leaders that we are logging what's happening on these devices, as well as enforce our acceptable use policies even on social networking and other Web 2.0 tools.
