Restrictions on Internet Content

joker08 said:
My wife received a laptop from work, when she tries to access certain websites, for example, gmail, it doesnt work gets a screen saying "restricted", Google however still works.
Connect to her work VPN everything works, well mostly everything works. I am wondering how is such a restriction possible.
I can see there is a custom DNS set when I click on connection properties, which ofcourse we cannot change.
Is it the DNS that's doing the filtering or is there anything else I can check ?
I want to setup something similar on my network.
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Why does your wife want to visit certain websites? she must use the laptop to do her work and not check her personal emails. If she wants to check her personal emails then she must use her own pc in her own time.

Regards
HR Manager
 
Snyper564 said:
Lol everytime we sign into our laptops it has this kind of disclaimer
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O you mean that big block of text that pops up on the screen when I press the power button and the thing starts that no-one reads? ;)
In a company wide meeting years ago I offered 1 days leave pasella to the first person that could list any 1 of the conditions on that list. No winners.
 
WollieVerstege said:
O you mean that big block of text that pops up on the screen when I press the power button and the thing starts that no-one reads? ;)
In a company wide meeting years ago I offered 1 days leave pasella to the first person that could list any 1 of the conditions on that list. No winners.
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Thats the one :P
 
Snyper564 said:
We have supreme levels of security on our work laptops from not being able to connect a flash disk to download a single file to gmail blocking file uploads - how its done I dont know I just know dont do anything not work related on it.

Oh yes all sites like youtube/facebook etc blocked too
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WalkWithMe said:
This is a company resource with their lockdown policy.
If you change settings, expect a discipline hearing
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ponder said:
It's not your property, leave it alone. Do you really want to risk getting your wife fired?
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Snyper564 said:
We have supreme levels of security on our work laptops from not being able to connect a flash disk to download a single file to gmail blocking file uploads - how its done I dont know I just know dont do anything not work related on it.

Oh yes all sites like youtube/facebook etc blocked too
Click to expand...

Its not about the laptop and who owns. Its the software they install. For example, I was fed up of the crappy laptop given to me so I used my own desktop and got IT to connect to VPN, IT took control of the desktop for 20 mins and the desktop was practically useless, they installed a lot of stuff and took all the control. I ended up switching back to the crappy laptop and buying a KVM switch and re-installing the OS on my desktop.

And honestly, this post was more about my curiosity than about my wife being able to access the internet on her laptop, she has plenty of alternate devices to check her email on.
 
joker08 said:
doesn't matter whose laptop it is. Even if you offer to use your own laptop they will put the same restrictions.
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Exactly, because you deal with company information and property which they (the company) need to protect.
 
Its all due to an agent installed on the laptop. There and many different types of software ranging from AV with basic black/whitelisting of sites (AV software can also lock down USB ports etc - most corporate version of AV can do this) and programs, DLP agents (data leakage prevention) which will block sensative documents and confidential info like cc's etc, and then there is also agents that pretty much record everything (file changes, processes running, registry changes etc)

It's all about protecting data and making sure users are as safe as possible. The last thing you want is some idiot user running some malware, then VPN'ing into the corporate network and letting ransomware loose.

BYOD is a nightmare for security people. There is no way any security department is going to let a user use their own laptop to VPN in and not have any security monitoring tools in place.

You want to connect to the corporate network you abide by their rules. Anyone who tries to bypass this deserves their marching letter.
 
Restrictive laptop policies are there to protect the company from noobs, disgruntled and malicious employees. That said it's annoying as hell for skilled and trustworthy employees. My work laptop has the following restrictions which actually impact my ability to perform my job well.
  • No gmail, no google calendar, no dropbox, no whatsapp, most websites are blocked, except Facebook and Twitter (strangely)
  • No admin rights so can't install anything, nor can I update any software
  • 2-factor auth into every app, with most requiring re-authentication multiple times a day (annoying!)
  • I connect to 3 different domains so I have to manage multiple passwords and associated policies (aside from the various application passwords that I need to manage)
  • USB devices blocked
  • No access to Task manager so I can't kill any malfunctioning apps, and have to restart if I have issues
  • It's got several AV and endpoint products installed which suck up at least 25% of the CPU at all times
  • It overheats quickly because of the load on the CPU and I've had to have the battery replaced twice in the last year because they expanded and cracked the casing and warped the keyboard
 
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