#Top internet filtering software install
According to its vendors, you install the software and worry no more. Internet filtering software has often been proposed as the solution to the problem of protecting children from inappropriate materials. One vendor of blocking software claims there are 400 million objectionable websites on his company’s list of blocked sites (Guelph Mercury, 2005). Nor is pornography the only contentious area: the Internet is also a prime communications medium for racist groups, political propaganda, the promotion of illegal drug use, libel, violent images and other objectionable materials.
Porn site operators, just like any other online entrepreneurs, design their sites to encourage and facilitate access. How many porn sites are there on the Web? Depending on whom you ask, the number is anywhere between 200,000 and 4.2 million (Musgrove, 2006). Internet pornography has grown into a 2.5 billion dollar business, with every indication that this growth will continue. Uncensored information and images can be posted with relative ease by virtually anyone. There has never been a centralized authority to control what goes online, and today it would be impossible to impose such authority (Benson, 2003).
In the United States, the figure is almost 99% (Simmons, 2005).Įducational purposes aside, however, the Internet is also a dark and seamy place. The Internet is used so much in our schools nowadays that even the most curmudgeonly of Luddites cannot deny that it is an established part of our education systems: at least 93% of Canadian schools use the Internet as a teaching tool (Statistics Canada, 2003/2004).
#Top internet filtering software Offline
In fact, many organizations have already begun the process of eliminating the offline alternative: for example, some post-secondary schools disseminate almost all information about their programs online, minimizing print publications and in some cases even eliminating them altogether. It has become as important to librarians as books are, and for some reference needs, such as accessing organizations’ contact information or looking up current legislation, the Internet far surpasses print sources for authoritativeness, currency, and ease of use. Anyone who works on a library reference desk can tell you the Internet has become so essential that it is now difficult to imagine working without it. Remember the early 1990s when so many of us thought the Internet was a fad, a flash-in-the-pan amusement for people with more time than brains? Many of us were reluctant to embrace the new technology, partly because we did not want to spend money on something that could turn out to be ephemeral and also because we did not yet understand the Internet’s ultimate usefulness.