Preventing access to a certain web page

[hapoo]

Does anyone know of a way to prevent people on a computer (or network) from accessing a certian web page?? Like would it be possible to ban people from visiting http://www.yahoo.com??

[AmRivlin]

If it is your mom or sister, then yes easily go to tools internet options and disallow yahoo.com... If it is a techie, (I dont think theyd be visiting yahoo.com anyway) but tell your router to not allow ip connects to 64.35.xxx.xxx

Or use a proxy server and set it up in that.

[hapoo]

Originally posted by AmRivlin
If it is your mom or sister, then yes easily go to tools internet options and disallow yahoo.com...


I thought that would be possible but i haven't seen an option for it.

[Jeffbx]

In Tools.. Internet Options.. Content Tab.. Enable Content Advisor. Under the 'Approved Sites' tab you can list sites that you want to always block or always allow.

Unfortunately, the Content Advisor is also a big pain in the ass - even when set at the most liberal setting, it will still block access to sites that are not rated - such as GotApex.

You might want to look at a 3rd party solution that gives you more control over what is and is not displayed. I don't know which ones offer complete control, but you may want to look at some personal firewalls (BlackIce, Sygate, Norton Personal Firewall) and/or parental control software (NetNanny, Siegesoft, Pronblocker).

[Hiro]

I would say that the banning of the IP through the router (if you are using one) would be more efficient than just disallowing it through windows.

[hapoo]

gotcha, only problem is that the page might use multiple IP's

[Jeffbx]

Good thought Corsec - that jarred the old memory banks...

Even if you don't have a router, you can block the address using the 'route' command. Let's say you want to block access to http://www.pepsi.com - 192.216.189.166. Type the following at the command prompt:

route add -p 192.216.189.166 MASK 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.0

That last address (192.168.1.0) should be your own IP address or a bogus address that's within your subnet. So, if you're using 192.168.1.1/24, for instance, it would have to be 192.168.1.x. This tells Windows to send all requests to see that address back to itself, and the request just times out.

The nice thing about this is that unless you're pretty well versed in Windows networking, you won't even think to look at the routing tables to unblock it.

The unfortunate part is that unless you have a static address or know the range of addresses that you'll grab from, you'll have to make this change every time you connect.

[Hiro]

the downside is though, if you use "192.168.1.x" it will ban everyone that is connected to your router from viewing that single IP address. what you might want to do is get the IP address for that one computer on the router and ban that one.

say your machine is "192.168.1.3" and your mothers is "192.168.1.4", just ban "192.168.1.4" and don't use the "x" in place of the "4". that way, its only hers that is blocked, not yours also.

[Jeffbx]

?? I don't think I was clear enough on that last one.

The .x is any INVALID address on your network - pick a number and put it in the 'x' position. That's the address that the PC will attempt to send requests for the site(s) you want to block. It's just sending the requests into a black hole.

Also, you make these changes on the PC, not the router. This solution is assuming you don't have a router.