The organizations face numerous risks from these practices ranging from distractions, loss of productivity, misuse of company resources to corporate data leakage. In this article, we will discuss why blocking social media access in the workplace is essential and how to do it with Scalefusion.
Further, as per the study, apart from the loss of productivity, due to zero or limited social media restrictions, it has resulted in an increase in loss of confidential information, defamation, misinformation and employee solicitation. Thus, it becomes extremely critical to block social media access at the workplace and from the corporate-owned devices.
A detailed drill down on the nature of usage and time spent, according to the report, Facebook is the most visited social media platform. Hence, besides having effective social media ethics and compliance initiatives, there must be a proper Mobile Device Management solution like Scalefusion for all the corporate-owned mobile devices.
Let us have a look at the various features of Scalefusion that help in blocking social media access in the workplace. Scalefusion can help in restricting social media apps and whitelisting the websites on all corporate-owned devices. IT admins can block the non-business websites and apps on the corporate-owned devices. When the employees use their personal devices for work, blocking social media access on BYOD is not possible. But to protect the corporate data from being misused, IT admins can enforce several data protection policies on the BYO devices to ensure that corporate data is not accessible from personal devices.
In Android and iOS devices, these settings can help in preventing the copy between personal and corporate apps.
After installing this add-on, go to its settings menu, and add the URLs to blacklist them. Save and exit the settings menu, and you will not be able to access the blacklisted websites anymore on Firefox. WasteNoTime is another useful Google Chrome extension to block websites and view the statistics of the websites you visit. You can create a list of blacklisted websites as well as whitelisted websites. As soon as you activate the Instant Lockdown feature, this extension will block internet for all the websites, excluding the allowed websites.
The Time Tracker feature is interesting one, as it displays all the visited websites along with time spent on them. If you want, you can set a maximum duration to visit blocked websites. If you visit a blocked website more than the given duration per day, you will be blocked. Another option lets you set a URL where you will be redirected if you try to access a blocked website.
Adding StayFocusd to Chrome as an extension, lets you spend less time on internet. It lets you restrict internet usage in many ways. You can set the time allowed per day to surf internet, select days in week to block internet, add websites to blocked list, add websites to allowed list, and much more. Internet blocking options available here let you block all websites, block all websites except the allowed ones, and block only the websites on the blocked list.
Advanced blocking options let you choose what you want to block on a website, such as: whole website or certain types of content. You also get to set the time to activate internet blocker. The options to set time for blocking are: Right now, when max time allowed has been exceeded, or at a specific time. This turns out helpful if you want to apply the settings in office environment or if you work on multiple computers.
Block Site Plus is a Chrome extension to block specific websites. All you need to do is enter the URL of website you want blocked. You can set the allowed time per day for a website in hours. Once the time limit is reached, there are certain actions that you can set to initiate. These options let you:. Its best used for personal use if you waste too much time on specific websites like, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc.
Free Firewall is a smart internet blocker software that lets you block internet separately for various applications software on your PC. After the installation of this software, it displays all the programs installed on your computer. In the Activate tab, it displays all the programs that are active, in the Inactive tab, you will find inactive programs.
You can directly block internet for active or inactive software from these tabs. You are also allowed to uninstall a specific software right from this software. An option named Blockade , which when turned on, disables internet connection of your PC instantly. You can also turn Firewall on to protect your computer from internet threats. This internet blocker software not only lets you disable internet, but also protects you from internet threats. Privacyware is more of an Internet Protection software, but also lets you block internet.
There are various options available under the menu options available here. You can either add websites to the Blocked website list to block them, or whitelist websites, or separately stop internet communication for installed software.
As I said, there are various other functions that it can carry out, but I am not going to discuss about them, and will focus on internet blocking part.
Under Main Menu, you can set internet security from High to Low. There are separate windows to add Trusted websites and Blocked websites. In the Applications menu, you will find the list of software installed on your PC. Firewall App Blocker lets you block internet access for certain programs. There are two options, namely: Edit and Firewall.
The Firewall option is what we have to use here. Unlike other applications, it will not scan programs automatically on your computer, but you will have to manually add the programs that you want to block internet access for. You will also find options to set different rules for outbound and inbound internet communication for different programs. If you want, you can add programs to whitelist as well.
After activating whitelist mode, all programs will be denied access to internet except the ones added in whitelist. It lets you block internet for specific applications. Moreover, it also provides password protection, so that no one can change your settings except you.
You are free to block internet access to applications for a given amount of time, or till the computer reboots. One of the features that I liked is that you can set hotkeys to carry out various operations.
Also, the software minimizes to the taskbar tray, providing a clutter free taskbar. If you do not want to apply restrictions on applications, you can block entire internet traffic. BlockSite is a free website blocker add-on for Firefox. Here, you can add websites to blacklist or whitelist. You can enable authentication option, where you will have to enter a password. So, everytime you want to access a blocked website, you will have to enter the password.
You can choose to display a custom warning message whenever someone tries to access the websites added in the blacklist. You can also add website URLs to whitelist. The whitelisted websites will only be available for access in this case. Your next step is to create a Facebook blocking rule using the URL mask.
Press Add and Facebook will be blocked instantaneously. You can adjust this rule according to your preferences hours, users, computers, etc. Having performed all these steps correctly, you will block access to Facebook on all browsers Google Chrome, Firefox and so on and personal computers of any capacity.
From now on, if an employee tries to access Facebook during business hours, he or she will get the notification or will be redirected to the company's policy webpage. Eliminate the annoying problem of employees' lack of focus caused by social media with the help of Work Examiner. Buy the Standard version that will satisfy all your basic requirements, or the Professional one that contains the full package of options.
All trials comes for free! Try for free Work Examiner software to block Facebook and other sites in your corporate environment. A Guide to Blocking Facebook. More than companies all over the world have chosen Work Examiner. This technique will prevent Facebook from loading: 1. You might have to press Enter to occupy the free bottom line; 3. Enter the necessary IP address Blocking Facebook on Macintosh OS If you are an Apple user or your working place is equipped with Mac computers, then you will need to do the following steps to block Facebook: 1.
Insert the IP address Write the Facebook page address here; 5. Blocking Facebook on iPhone and iPad Social media websites are often accessed from mobile phones and tablets.
It should consist of four numbers. This will save your new settings and prevent accessing Facebook from a mobile browser like Google Chrome, Safari, Opera, and others; In case you have the Facebook application, you will need to delete it. The restriction options do not affect special applications designed for social media websites. It will be impossible to install it once again because downloads from the store are forbidden as well.
Make sure to delete all other browsers on your iPhone or iPad. The most common and reliable browsers like Google Chrome, Safari, and some others will obey the restriction settings and ban Facebook. Yet, unreliable and unknown browsers will not be influenced by these settings, which is why you will need to delete them. In order to do so, press the browser icon and hold it. Blocking Facebook on Android Smartphones If you have an Android gadget, there are plenty of options for blocking unwanted websites.
Select the necessary plugin from there and open it; In the options of the plugin, you can insert the website addresses you want to forbid. All the other features depend on the plugin you are using. Blocking Facebook with Work Examiner Even though it is possible to prohibit websites on a PC without downloading additional software, the process takes quite a lot of time and it is inefficient for blocking more than one website.
Install Work Examiner Work Examiner may be installed in your network in several minutes. Enable https filtering Facebook. Set up a web filter rule Create a web blocking rule using facebook.
0コメント