Comments on: Brief Facebook block was a technical glitch

By: VIHA employee

VIHA employee — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:34:31 +0000

looks like the vancouver island health authority has blocked my facebook browsing during lunch. I have no access to it or through http://www.GoToFacebook.co.za. trouble is it has replaced much email correspondence normally done with my email software and now i cannot receive important messages while on break. This should make good media fodder.

By: Roland

Roland — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 05:04:42 +0000

It’s so easy to get around those Facebook blocks, even if they were put their intentionally.

All one has to do is go to http://www.GoToFacebook.co.za, type in the URL of Facebook and there you are!

By: Allycat

Allycat — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 19:46:11 +0000

And I bet the black helicopters are flying over your house right now, Dingo….

By: Kempton

Kempton — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 02:50:07 +0000

Websense categorizes sites and blocks by category, and facebook et al and any personal blogs that Websense have processed would all fall under one category. So a (mis)configuration that blocked that category would take all those sites out in one fell swoop.

So if that was the case, should we have seen a lot of personal sites been blocked? After all, teamakers blog under http://teamakers.blogspot.com/ which the “glitch should have bought down all sites under blogspot.com ?

Lets hope this kind of “technical glitch” doesn’t happen often. After all, CBC is a respected institution in my book and I hate to see bad stuff happen to it.

Just my 2 cents.

By: Kev

Kev — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 21:02:54 +0000

How did personal blogs “accidentally” get to be blocked? And the facebook and myspace block was an “accident” too?

By: Kev

Kev — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 20:53:27 +0000

Wait till Google rolls out their just-announced facebook-killer. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

By: Rachel

Rachel — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 20:39:39 +0000

I wonder if it was local to Vancouver? Your morning would have been my lunch, and I had no problems accessing Facebook and personal blogs over lunch.

By: erin

erin — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 20:24:07 +0000

I’m sure it was a glitch.

However, there’s clearly a blacklist somewhere in the software for this kind of thing… the glitch was that the block was activated, the list itself isn’t a bug.

So the real question is: who made the list? Is it just part of websense, or did someone in the corp draw it up?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 18:27:13 +0000

I took a break for some ‘fresh air’ as soon as I heard this news…
In the pods surrounding me, in the elevator, in the atrium downstairs, and finally the space where those of us collect our ‘fresh air’… EVERYONE was talking about facebook.

… and by the time I returned to my desk the story had changed from ‘blocked’ to ‘glitch’.

It truly blows my mind just how global this social network has become.

By: anonymous

anonymous — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:29:57 +0000

I’m glad it’s a technical glitch. After all if I can’t check my personal stuff during my break time, that’s means I’ll stopping checking work stuff at home. TIT for TAT and all that!

By: Anonymous2

Anonymous2 — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:29:03 +0000

^
This guy must have no friends…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:16:45 +0000

There isn’t an internet site that wastes more time than Facebook. Its a social network for people to look at their friends pictures and read what their cousins daughter is doing on vacation. If there is a legitmate work reason to access Facebook, cetainly a technician can enable overrides for particular staff members (ie. reporters). I’m happy to see Facebook blocked. I only wish that all Federal Government Departments would do the same.

By: Kempton

Kempton — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:15:18 +0000

How did personal blogs “accidentally” get to be blocked? And the facebook and myspace block was an “accident” too?

I hope CBC is not simply blame some low-level I.T. person on all the problems instead of facing up to what happen.

Sometime, the coverup (especially badly executed ones) can be worst than the original trouble (no matter how bad it may look).

By: Randall

Randall — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:02:42 +0000

Ah, that’s not good at all.

I had hoped for better from CBC.

By: Sooo not telling

Sooo not telling — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:02:25 +0000

I hope that Kev is right about a config error. At any rate as soon as things are clarified a bit (as to exactly what happened and what is blocked) I’ll start finding and talking about workarounds. Even in China there are ways.

By: leia

leia — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:00:56 +0000

But there’s a thread I was watching

By: Kev

Kev — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:59:40 +0000

Actually, scratch that, it is deliberate.

By: Kempton

Kempton — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:58:41 +0000

Tod,

CBC blocks free speech? I thought it will never come to this.

Thanks for reporting on this and keeping your readers posted. I am also blogging about this to keep others informed as this is more than an internal CBC story.

By: John Bignell

John Bignell — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:58:04 +0000

Why have the “The Facebook cbc network” when the CBC blocks the site? I always find it interesting how companies respond to Facebook and other social sites. Maybe they should block the internet completely that is the only safe way to protect the CBC from the outside “online” world.

By: Paul

Paul — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:57:55 +0000

Seems to affect some computers and not others – probably the journalistic exemption at work. I imagine we’ll get some official statement well after everyone has flown into a tizzy.