Content filter for Firefox?

January 9, 2005 8:28 AM

Is there a Firefox extension that filters adult content a la IE's Content Advisor? I'm doing well at converting people to FF, but one colleague needs a content filter for his kids. Unless my Google-fu is badly broken, there doesn't seem to be one and, unless I'm very blind, FF doesn't have one by default. Mozilla update also brings blanks, but I can't believe that no-one's thought of building one yet.
posted by TheDonF to computers & internet (12 comments total)

Well, if you do the google search firefox adult content filter the first result is this, which includes a link to BlockXXX.

I have no personal experience with it, but it seems like a good start.
posted by littlegreenlights at 9:03 AM on January 9, 2005

Well, okay, I installed it, and none of the links on AskMe showed up any more, while (this was a random test) fucktit.com loads perfectly, complete with animated gifs. So . . . yeah, no BlockXXX.
posted by littlegreenlights at 9:09 AM on January 9, 2005

Argh! I spent over an hour on Google trying all kinds of things and got nowhere. The shame of this....

The extension isn't great (but then for FF 1.0 it's only on version 0.1) - it works on an onload event so you get a view of the images until the page is fully loaded. Only after that are they removed. It also hasn't blocked some entire pages that I would have expected it to.

What's really needed is something that something that works with something like PICS
posted by TheDonF at 9:20 AM on January 9, 2005

If you run Windows, this idea might work. (Haven't tried it myself.)
posted by GirlFriday at 9:37 AM on January 9, 2005

Does Firefox have forums for questions like these? Not being snarky - I have no idea, and would be interested myself in knowing.
posted by xammerboy at 9:39 AM on January 9, 2005

xammerboy: there's a thread on MozillaZine about it, but that leads to the not great BlockXXX extension.

GirlFriday: thanks, it's worth a suggestion, but it's nothing like as straight forward as IE's thing; I'm really looking for a non-geek "typical PC user" solution.

I wonder if not having this built into FF will hinder its uptake?
posted by TheDonF at 9:45 AM on January 9, 2005

Aren't there mainstream packages that intercept any HTTP request? That way it's independent of browser.
posted by abcde at 9:59 AM on January 9, 2005

A filtering proxy server would be more efficient than an FF extension. It sounds like this one could work for your needs.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 10:45 AM on January 9, 2005

nakedcodemonkey: cheers, but it needs to be easy, think of 'installation and usage by ones parents' (assuming they're not computer geeks themselves!). This installation isn't simple!

I agree with people's comments that a browser-independant choice is going to be more effective, especially as FF extensions can be uninstalled, but it has to be simple, simple, simple to work.

Unfortunately, I may be onto a loser here.
posted by TheDonF at 11:28 AM on January 9, 2005

There are tons of standalone filtering programs on the market, so they should be able to take their pick.

If the platform is Windows, DNS Kong was recommended in a related thread.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 11:58 AM on January 9, 2005

If you want to stick with a browser-based approach, the Mozilla familiy including Firefox has these PICS settings available.

browser.PICS.disable_for_this_session
Turn off PICS until next session?

browser.PICS.pages_must_be_rated
Only allow viewing of PICS-rated pages?

browser.PICS.ratings_enabled
Enables PICS ratings?

browser.PICS.reenable_for_this_session
Turn PICS back on for the remainer of this session?

I couldn't find any further documentation but you can easily experiment by adding/setting these via about:config. Once you figure out the right combo of settings, it's not that hard to walk someone through config steps. Of course, as you noted, the kids can easily undo this if they care to...
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 12:13 PM on January 9, 2005

Thanks nakedcodemonkey. I'm trying the setings out on playboy.com which has PICS labelling for naughty content and none of them seem to do anything (although I've no idea what to expect FF to do, so maybe they are).

The standalone products look like they might be my best shot.
posted by TheDonF at 11:41 PM on January 9, 2005