White Papers for Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC)

Avoiding Legal Traps on the Web: Protecting Your Organization with Internet Filtering

St. Bernard Software

As a security specialist, I find that companies pay plenty of attention to hardening their servers and networks but pay little attention to how uncontrolled Internet access from within an organization can represent a significant legal and security risk.

For example, a university in California was warned it might be held liable for permitting downloads of a copyrighted movie1. And a company in Arizona was fined $1 million for file sharing activity hosted on the company’s computers2.

These and other events add up to an increase in exposure to liability as a result of a worker’s illegal activity on the Internet while using company equipment. Additionally, users who browse a malicious Web site can become infected with a Trojan or other malware without their knowledge as a result of vulnerabilities in Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) and the difficulty of keeping computer systems updated. Internet filtering technology, which is typically associated with increasing work efficiency by reducing time spent on non-essential Internet sites, is a key player in mitigating these threats.

This white paper discusses the various methods available for Internet filtering and how to use them to increase security and decrease legal exposure.

View the White Paper

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