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Clueless about myspace proxy servers

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by tkrieger

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Am I the only school network administrator that was clueless about myspace proxy servers?

I was feeling very proud of our Netgear Firewall ability to block unwanted sites. Like all the other schools in the country, myspace is at the top of the list.
A much younger techy friend of mine was helping me do updates at our school the other day - and I was showing him that myspace was blocked. Imagine my surprise when he immediately did a google search of :"netgear firewall myspace" and came up with literally hundreds of hits for proxy servers that go around your firewall. If this young man knew - what about the rest the kids in the country?

Has anyone else encountered this? What did you do about it?

12 replies

by now left tr

With web blocking software on it.

Anyway my PCs are locked down so proxy settings can't be changed anyway.

What model of Netgear did you get?

by tkrieger

We are using a Netgear FVL 363 - I do have the don't allow proxy servers checked.

Thanks

by kjell_andorsen

Restricting proxies on the firewall is a good thing, but you need to lock down the browser settings on workstations as well. IF you're running an Active Directory domain you can lock down proxy settings pretty well with GPOs, not to mention alot of other browser settings. Kids are smart and WILL eventually try to circumvent your rules. There are hundreds of sites and discussion boards that offer tips on how to circumvent these things, you might want to join a few and monitor them just to keep up on the circumvention techniques out there.

by rknrlkid

We are in the same situation. In spite of conventional wisdom, today's youth are very intelligent and figure ways to get around the rules. MySpace is the least bad of what they go to from my experience. We have a problem keeping them off of gang and drug related sites.

by tkrieger

I guess I should consider myself fortunate.
We have good kids - our goal is to keep them that way.

by rknrlkid

I forgot to say that I work at a dropout recovery program. Our students aren't exactly the top of list ones. Many of them are challenged when it comes to obeying authority.

by jbcoops

I taught at Richmond High in California for four years. You all might know about it from the movie "Coach Carter" (he started there the year after I left). Yes, there were over two dozen gangs there, yes the students were amongst the worst in the nation (the school ranked in the 4th percentile at the time). However, labeling kids good/bad etc. because they "disobey authority" is a shaky test at best.

Bottom line is: school bores the heck out of most kids. Why do you think that they're trying out proxy servers to get around firewalls? One reason is for the most part teachers don't know where to go online for interesting activities for students. I do, and if you're interested in seeing what I did with these "bad students" take a look at an article I wrote "Building 21st Century Collaborative Learning Communities" at http://snurl.com/netc1
Perhaps educators should also consider ways to address students searching out info on gangs and drugs in ways other than locking out info at school.

Locking down computers and filtering is only part of what is needed. Locking out MySpace for example does nothing to make the kids safe. It might make the *school* safe from possible lawsuits, but unless you offer a NetSafe class (or club) your students will be on there *without any support or guidance*. This is what's appalling about the state of IT in K-12 today. Much of what is done is not for the sake of the student, it's for the safety of the admin.

Students *should* be actively engaged with their own education. Global project based learning sites such as http://www.takingitglobal.org and http://www.nabuur.com should be part of upper grade curricula. However, many districts will block these sites because of several features they have. How does your district handle requests to *unfilter*?

Try connecting to Tapped In at http://www.tappedin.org ...don't try it at school because it has live chat and will undoubtedly be filtered. I give two tours today (at 10a.m. a "Collaborative Community" meeting and at 11a.m. a tour of the "K-12 Campus" (which is the safest and most secure site for K-12 students to work online). IT Directors and K-12 students alike should also know about TechSupportForum at http://www.techsupportforum.com which is a truly excellent site for getting online tech help.

Contact me at jbcoops@gmail.com if you'd like more info. I'll keep an eye on this thread and see how things go.

Regards,

Jeff Cooper
Education Technology Support Consultant

by tkrieger

Thanks for the info. We are running Active Directory on our domain. I do have a few policies in force through Group Policy - locking the screen savers out, Control Panel, etc. I hesitated to set too many rules because I have not had any training in Active Directory - a little change at a time!
However, I will lock down the proxy settings from GP.
Thanks for the info

by pozillia

In all honesty, I have a question. I am a highschool student. And if "your" highschools are anything like the ones I've attended in the past 2 years.. Then myspace is the most education we get in our computer classes. We type, work on our social skills, and learn a bit about the computer technology. Not to mention, the research we do to find the proxies to log onto myspace. What is the big deal about students logging onto myspace? What harm is it causing YOU?

Or is it just another control issue the government has?

by aranda28147

I'll give you the typing skills but the rest is garbage! Social skills are what you do with your free time or class discussion. If you aren't getting anything out of your classes maybe you need to re-evaluate you learning level. Maybe the classes aren't challenging enough or maybe you just find them boring...but in no way could myspace be considered a learning tool. And the harm to us in the IT department would be all the viruses/spyware that myspace distributes. If you were to just sit in for one day with a network administrator who had to clean up after someone with your attitude, seeing what it takes to keep a network clean and flowing you might gain some understanding.

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