What’s more, even when their filter did work, it only scanned URLs and resulted in inaccurate reporting and overclocking. While some of the educational content filtered was blocked, their filter struggled to block all inappropriate content; this made it difficult for the Spencer IT team to manage blocklists and tailor them to specific groups.

It was obvious that their previous web filter could not keep up with the internet’s role in learning environments.

How Smoothwall helped

Spencer schools needed a reliable solution that would protect their network. Smoothwall’s Unified Threat Management was chosen to be an all-in-one solution, providing content-aware web filtering, anti-malware, and next-generation firewall.

Consolidating their tools was just the first step in simplifying their network security. Landon and his team put their blocklist issues to rest with content-aware analysis and customized policy groups.

Spencer schools activated the Safeguarding feature that complemented the Unified Threat Management’s easy-to-use solution. With granular and real-time reporting, Spencer administrators now receive alerts of serious breaches of their web safety policy and create a background for the activity related to the breach.

In addition to reporting, Safeguarding’s content categorization uses the analyzed traffic and assigns it to seven categories of concern based on the context of the previous online activity. This has given the Iowa school district an added layer of student safety.

“Smoothwall’s Unified Threat Management has simplified how we manage our network. It’s education-specific features help us protect students from online harm and maintains productivity, all at an affordable price,” said Landon.