Hi, with kids doing remote learning, it will be very helpful to block sites like YouTube on their pc’s. Is that possible assuming static ips for the pc’s? I’m tried google, but wasn’t able to find anything on the topic, but seems like it should be doable! So hoping the experts here can help. Thanks! I’m using pfsense as my router/firewall.
Well I suppose it depends on what your set-up is, but it sounds like you will snooker yourself if you follow your approach!
If I was to approach the problem, I’d set up vlans, create a child - vlan, then anything you do can simply be applied to that vlan without affecting anyone else in the house.
If you setup pfsense on a router, then you can use pfblocker, there are various lists it pulls from that block-out porn, gambling, adverts etc. Have a look if Youtube is blocked on those lists (perhaps it can be added). There are some social media lists, for blocking facebook etc, you might find them useful.
You could also schedule their internet access to be switched off too.
If you aren’t familiar with pfsense then there are a few YouTube videos you might want to look at before you block it off
If you do something on the machine then it will eventually be circumvented. If your children are bright they can just setup a VPN and bypass all your efforts
e2guardian will do what you need, either running on pfsense (or other firewalls), or running on a linux proxy server.
Thanks…I tried to install by following the instructions on git, but when I run from command prompt, nothing happens and in fact, I lost all my packages!
fetch -q -o /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/Unofficial.conf https://raw.githubusercontent.com/marcelloc/Unofficial-pfSense-packages/master/Unofficial.24.conf
Sounds like I need a patch…but the patch says it’s for 2.4.4 and I’m on pfsense 2.4.5. Will it still work?
Any ideas?
Yes, I needed the patch before it would fetch the repo. Works fine on the current version, or at least on the one system I tried it on. I still need to upgrade my work firewall, but did test on my home firewall to make sure things still functioned. Home is on current release of pfsense.
I really wish there was a way to get this integrated into the official repo, I forget why it is not there.