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The following explains the most common problems. Please read each of the sections below to see if there is an answer to your particular issue before submitting the form. NOTE: The E2BN filtering policy can be read here and there are FAQs here. IMPORTANT Many of the most common problems arise because the school and/or staff are using the wrong filter profile. Please check with your ICT staff and/or LA helpdesk that you are using the profile most appropriate to your school. It is very important that staff access the STAFF profile as this allows downloads from untrusted sites (e.g. zip files); allows access to IP only sites and has a higher threshold for blocking. Before submitting a comment please make sure that you are using the most appropriate profile - if it is not the correct one then please contact your School or LA's ICT support. This is a School/LA setting which is NOT controlled by E2BNProtex. (1) Commercial/public web-mail. The E2BN policy on web-mail is included in the general policy referred to above. In essence this can be boiled down to a single sentence: we treat web-mail in exactly the same way as any other website. Because they are subject to SPAM and often contain unsuitable advertising the content filtering system may block access to certain pages. LA sponsored systems are automatically trusted if they are in the .gov.uk or .sch.uk domains. Others may be added at the discretion of E2BNProtex or the LA as appropriate. (2) zip files can only be downloaded by STUDENTS from TRUSTED sites. (3) Commercial hosting / site-builders / forums / social networks, etc. are usually treated in the same way as other websites but some are blocked. However, even a site which is not explicitly blocked may be surrounded by advertising causing all or part of it to be blocked. (4) Online games are blocked. Particular games can be made available if the exact URL of the game is submitted. (5) Search engines: some search engines direct their searches via other: this can result in an innocuous search being blocked for no obvious reason as the site being blocked is not the one searched for (e.g. landing.domainsponsor.com). Use one of the more regular search engines (e.g. google, yahoo, bing, ask jeeves, etc.) which are either designed for school use or where the filtering system can enforce "safe search". (6) Misspelling a URL or using the wrong one (e.g. entering .co.uk when the sites is actually a .org.uk) may result in a block: please check the URL being blocked as these simple typos are often redirected to commercial advertising sites (landing.domainsponsor.com and apps5.oingo.com/apps/domainpark, for example). (7) Some profiles block access to sites using their IP address and not a domain name. Some web-mail systems also use unnamed servers and are blocked when using these profiles. Only submit this form if you think the site you are blocked from is mis-categorised and you have read the information given above. Using this form gives us the information required to determine exactly why a site has been blocked and how best to respond. |
