Can a Netgear Router block facebook?

[Grollsta]

Hi peoples!

I have a netgear router on my LAN. Its fed by Virgin Media via a coax cable. The netgear router provides my DHCP ad WLAN in the house.

I have a need to block facebook and a few other time consuming sites.

I configured the router via it's admin interface to block these sites, but it has no affect.

Can therouteractually block sites if I want it to?

Or must I set up a firewall machine between the router and the virgin cable modem?

thanks in advance
graeme

 

[Dwebs-Ltd]

Whats the netgear model?

Shouldn't be any issues with blocking if its done right even on netgears there are a couple of ways of doing it, if you let me know the model i will have a read at the manual.

 

[Grollsta]

thanks! its a WGR614 v7 Netgear 54G.

 

[Dwebs-Ltd]

thanks! its a WGR614 v7 Netgear 54G.

So you went to the block sites menu item

Selected keyword blocking - Always
Entered keyword facebook or the domain facebook.com then clicked Add Keyword
Then clicked apply?

I would enter *facebook* so thats any website that has facebook in the address etc

 

[Grollsta]

Yes, correct, that is what I did. and if I check it again after the changes were applied, they are correct, but have no affect. My daughter is supposed to be swotting for exams and I want to make absolutely sure she cannot access FB or others.

 

[Dwebs-Ltd]

How is she connected wireless or wired?

Also try blocking in the service section to IP 69.63.176.140 on port 80 then on her pc try http://69.63.176.140 and see if it lets you through. Note thats one of facebook's IP's there's ton's of them i just want to see if its actually working or not!

 

[Grollsta]

ok will try that. all the PC's are wireless on the LAN.

Thanks Chris

 

[Dwebs-Ltd]

Also have a look under the logs menu

It should show a web access log

Would be handy to know what its saying for facebook!

 

[Subbynet]

Failing the ideas above, you could also set your DNS to use OpenDNS, and from that you can then block social networking sites.

 

[ExpandOnline]

I was trying the same thing with my netgear router, and changing the blocking settings was having no effect - then I upgraded the firmware with the latest from the netgear site and it all started working.

I guess the feature was not fully implemented in the firmware I had.

 

[kayak]

My girlfriend uses facebook to share revision material, are you sure you aren't in fact taking a useful tool away from your daughter...!

 

[Rick F]

My girlfriend is constantly on facebook instead of making the tea!

Is there a resticted site feature on Safari like there is on IE?

 

[stugster]

Failing the ideas above, you could also set your DNS to use OpenDNS, and from that you can then block social networking sites.

You just saved me typing

 

[FireFleur]

How about not going there

There is an easy way to do it per host if you like.

echo 127.0.0.1 facebook.com >> /etc/hosts

Probably something else you can do on other operating systems that is similar.

 

[LINGsCARS]

Couldn't you set your PCs to read from a hosts file on your website (for example), then you can redirect or block any website access?

 

[FireFleur]

%SystemRoot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

Is a windows location.