Blocking sites by keyword
I saw it was mentioned before and closed.
I really would like to reopen the discussion. Make it optional and opt-in for people to use it, but we really, really would like this functionality. New sexsites and things grow up like mushrooms. it is impossible for OpenDns to keep up with this. Google is way faster in finding things than opendns in blocking and youngsters are very keen on finding these holes in Opendns sometimes. I need a way to block unwanted things from my network here, even if this means a larger chance on false positives.
So please reconsider. Shouldn't be too hard to implement.
Cheers
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@virtuapphire
Yes, your message is off-topic in this thread. You should have opened a new thread in the right section like "Community Help".
And no, you cannot whitelist 123rf.com if you have the addresses 208.67.222.123 and 208.67.220.123 configured, because this domain has "adult" categories assigned:
https://domain.opendns.com/123rf.comAnother way to access the domain nevertheless is to add the following entry to your local hosts file:
103.14.245.12 123rf.com www.123rf.com
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i understand where your coming from. In all honesty if OpenDNS does not add alternative (automated) ways of tagging domains then it will fail to be a useful service if it isn't already. Visit this page https://community.opendns.com/domaintagging/, i'm told on the far right: 3,146,306 decided out of 9,876,465. Now if i compare these figures with nortons dns service which is mostly powered by (automated) algorithms etc the figures are and i quote: "Norton ConnectSafe uses the Web content categorization data from our own Symantec RuleSpace service. Our content categorization data include more than 50 million Web sites covering 23 different languages." (https://connectsafe.norton.com/faq.html).
Ignoring the whole idea of automattion by OpenDNS is having a negative impact on the organisation, although they dont realise it now, they will. This service is failing in some sense, change has to happen!, soon!
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Did you catch the wrong thread by mistake or intentionally?
Did you mean to comment on https://support.opendns.com/entries/21681099 instead? -
We aren't asking for OpenDNS to create something that is capable of categorizing a site into 1 or more of the 60 available categories.
Instead, and i think i speak for most OpenDNS users out there, we would like you to create an automated system that specifically focuses on categorizing sites into the following categories based on keywords: Pornography, Sexuality, Nudity.
Sites that fall into the categories mentioned above are usually far easier to detect than say a site that falls into the category "Ecommerce/Shopping".
An example would be "amazon.com", nothing about the domain suggests that it belongs in the category "Ecommerce/Shopping". However a website with the domain name "F***aP***y.com" will 9 times out of 10 be a hit for the categories "Pornography","Sexuality", and "Nudity".
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Absolutely right, and that's why this domain is categorized this way: https://domain.opendns.com/fuckapussy.com
What did you speak about again? ;-)"specifically focuses on categorizing sites into the following categories based on keywords: Pornography, Sexuality, Nudity."
Why this? I would focus more on categories like Gambling, Hate/Discrimination, Religious, Tasteless and Weapons. And a third person again may have different preferences. Yours are just individual and specific to you, not common requirement.
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I'd simply like a further category called 'Key Word' added in the same location as the White List and Block List. In the keyword section I want to be able to type in whatever word I wish and if that word is present in the URL and perhaps other places - Tags, even the web page - then the page is automatically blocked. It isn't that hard to implement, I imagine. For those who don;t want the feature, they can simply choose not to use it.
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@anonymous_1001 Unless you took a poll you have no way of knowing how many OpenDNS users you speak form. You only know for certain that you speak for yourself. I can say that there are many users, either as home users, or businesses that simply are not concerned about those types of domains, but are concerned about others. Regardless, OpenDNS has made it clear in other statements that they will not do automated categorization of domains. I'm sure part of that has to do with that even if they properly categorized 9 out of 10, 1 out of 10 *will* be miscategorized. Which is why they have the manual system that they have now.
@stvace77 What you are describing is not a category in the sense that OpenDNS is using the terms. It is flatout key word blocking of domains, a feature that OpenDNS had years ago and removed. I don't see them adding it back. As for blocking by keywords bad on URL's, tag, web page, content, or anything else, that is simply impossible for OpenDNS to do because OpenDNS, like any other DNS system knows nothing about any of those things because that information is not passed to it, only the domain that is being looked up. IF OpenDNS chose to resume keyword blocking they would only be able to do it on domain names, nothing else. Nor does OpenDNS block webpages, it ONLY blocks domains that your account settings require to be blocked, and then only if it receives a domain look request for that specific domain. Your imagination is flawed, with incorrect and invalid information, and thus the assertion based on that imagination that such a thing is easy is flawed. Much of what you ask for is technically impossible, and the rest OpenDNS already did in the past and removed.
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So naive you are anonymous*. No ODNS staff will come to your aid unless you're having problems setting up their software, or connecting your boxes. Consider a paid account if you hope for staff support.
Read the posts in this thread, then go hack to the archived forum. There's no keyword support here. Never has, Wont happen. How much are you paying for this free service. Syamantec offers a similar system. No keywords there either.
BYW, rotblitz is one of the few helpful volunteers here. Like many of us, there's low tolerance for whiners.
ODNS is what it is. No keywords, no site voting, no nirvana.
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I never claimed, pretended, or acted like I'm an OpenDNS employee. In fact on many occasions both rotblitz and I have clearly stated that we are not OpenDNS emplyees.
As for you command about what I can or cannot do or say in this forum, I think I'll ignore it since this is a community discussion board. If you don't like it you are welcome to ignore me. If you only want to hear from OpenDNS employees you are welcome to open support tickets instead of posting to this forum.
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I might be wrong as well. I have a memory of a keyword feature having been available somewhere on a network configurations page, and then at some point it was removed. I might be confusing it with another feature that was removed. Regardless I have sufficient IT experience to regard keyword blocking or security as basically worthless or causing more troubles than it cures so wouldn't have used it. What's really relevant is that OpenDNS doesn't have a keyword blocking feature and has demonstrated no interest or desire in implementing one, *especially* in their free service.
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Or even this... http://www.symantec.com/page.jsp?id=rulespace
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So let me get this straight. You're using a free security service, and you want them to link to and incorporate technology from another company that they do not maintain or control themselves, at least one of which functions in a manner completely different from how their service operates (URL filtering instead of domain name resolution and filtering), and they would likely need to pay for this service (in addition to internal time and cost to develop the incorporation). All so that you can have a feature added to a free service that the company has already said they do not support and will not be adding?
If this functionality is so important to you, why don't you just use those products instead? Or are they not free as well?
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A web crawler could be used to scrape the title/meta tags of pages on a website to determine its category. E.g.
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This scarping idea is very good, its something that could actually work. If you guys (the people behind OpenDNS) pull this off, you'll be the very first DNS service to automate categorization on a massive scale.
I propose the following model:
- User tags a domain with one or more categories. (we cant expect you to scrape the entire web!)
- Bot analyses the title and meta tags of submitted domain.
- If the category/categories with which the site has been tagged with are correct, the bot accepts the tag. If not, the website is left for manual voting.
See attached file(s) as an example.
(I have included 4 examples - LinkedIn, Amazon, HP and Apple)
From the examples we can see how accurate it is. And of course, it will be. Website owners want people to visit
Amazon_titleAndMetaTags.png
Apple_titleAndMetaTags.png
HP_titleAndMetaTags.png
LinkedIn_titleAndMetaTags.png -
"have nothing positive to contribute"
Did you got the impression I contributed negatively or neutrally? I'm not aware of that. The only real contribution (beside very brief comments) was to explain how one can do it, at this time where it's not possible with OpenDNS. Was this a bad idea? (No, you do not need to answer.)
"please refrain from posting anything which will lead to a pointless discussion."
I do not see that you'd be in a position to ask people refraining from anything here and from judging to what it leads if they do not refrain...
"I would like OpenDNS staff to see the above"
No problem! Open a support ticket with a link to "the above". So easy!
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@anonymous_1001 Sorry, you don't get to control what other people say on this forum. So long as I stay within the forum rules I (or anyone else here) can respond however we want to any post, whether or not you think it will lead to pointless discussion.
As rotblitz said, if you only want to communicate with OpenDNS staff you need to open a support ticket with them.
As for your idea, it is a rife opportunity for abuse. All I need to do is create a website with "false" metatags, such as creating a porn site with metatags that identify it as a cooking site, go to OpenDNS and tag the domain with a category relevant to cooking. According to your description that porn site would then be automatically approved for an inaccurate category, and "shielded" from being properly tagged until a staff member manually intervenes.
Sorry, this is just one of many reasons that automatic categorization doesn't work and OpenDNS has steadfastly refused to do it. It is too open to abuse and inaccuracies, which are the bane of any security product. Although manual tagging, voting, and approval are inefficient it is going to be far, far more accurate for everything that does get tagged.
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"All I need to do is create a website with "false" metatags" - Perfectly good point @mattwilson9090.
For owners of adult websites (or any other for that matter) this would never be an option (false meta-tags). Doing so would result in not appearing in relevant search results and as a consequence this would lead to a reduced number of visitors (which could result in lower ad generated revenue).
Now there is still the argument of what-if they do. Well, my answer would be to do a trial run and see if this sort of thing is an actual issue rather than a hypothetical one.
In a previous comment on this thread i stated the following on May 28, 2015.
"i'm told on the far right: 3,146,306 decided out of 9,876,465."
As of now (Feb 11 2016) the current figures are:
Submitted domains: 10,352,266
Decided domains: 3,211,971
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In around 8 months,
The number of submitted/undecided domains has risen by 475,801.
And the number of decided domains has risen by 65,665.
In simple, for every 1 domain decided, 7 more are added.
Why? - although this is a free service, many people want to use the internet rather than spending their time tagging domains.
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LOL, I don't know where you've been, but adult websites were one of the earliest groups of online vendors to use false metatags. It is obviously an option for them or they wouldn't be doing it.
There is no theoretical what-if discussion here. This kind of thing is already happening, and is a common tool for the less than scrupulous SEO (search engine optimization) vendors out there. Even if a trial run is attempted, when it becomes an obvious failure there would need to be a mechanism for correcting the many domains there were improperly categorized.
I don't disagree that we need more activity on tagging and classifying domains, but automated mechanisms are not suited to this either because algorithms are simple not capable of reliably understanding context or because they have such a long track record of being abused by those who want to sidestep or manipulate them. Those are all reasons why OpenDNS has always refused to use an automated process for this key function of their service.
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