SCOTTISH computer experts have developed a new way to scan internet pages and stop pornography and offensive sites being loaded on to school and company computers.
The system, by the Livingston-based company Bloxx, analyses the language and pictures to see if they contain harmful or damaging material.
Until now, much blocking software relied on compiling lists of "off-limits" websites which were increasingl
y difficult to keep track of as the internet expanded.
In addition, the new system also allows access to social networking sites to be restricted to particular times of the day so that they can only be used during breaks. The new software is being adopted by companies in an effort to cut down on online time-wasting.
In recent months, "internet skiving" has emerged as a problem for employers. Thousands of government, corporate and even school computers are being used to make trivial or even offensive edits on the internet encyclopedia Wikipedia. A recent study estimated that time lost through social networking sites was costing UK companies about £130m a day. And last month three council employees in Wales were sacked for spending hours on eBay.
The new system works by scanning pictures and language for the signs of offensive material. Rather than simply blocking pages containing certain keywords, like "sex" it scans all the words in text to analyse the context and decide which sites should be blocked.
For example, a school computer might need blocking from "adult" content but still need to be able to access pages about the history of fighting sex discrimination.
A Bloxx spokesman said: "There are certain ways to analyse pages which might not be obvious at first, but which allow you to analyse what a page is really about. For example, a race-hate page often features the word 'they' a lot, and you can use that fact to help devise intelligent ways to screen out damaging material, even if no-one has ever seen the page before.
"Similarly, a pornographic picture can have certain characteristics which can be analysed by a computer, the tones of the picture for example, and these factors can be used to block them from loading into the computer."
Previous attempts to filter internet pages involved having specialists, known as "porn monkeys" manually scanning through sites and trying to guess where undesirable content might be lurking. They would then note the names and addresses of the problem pages and add them to lists of blocked content. Another tactic involved banning pages with single key words from coming through filters.
The spokesman added: "The problem is that the internet is growing all the time and people are adding blogs and new sites all the time, and it's just not possible to keep track of them in the traditional way."
Last week, the new software was adopted by the shipping company Graypen, which employs hundreds of staff around the UK.
In addition to wasting company time, personal internet use is also a major drain on company and public computing systems. Connecting to websites clogs up computer networks and slows machines down.
The full article contains 528 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
