Smoothwall (our webfiltering/firewall solution) will work on two upgrades during the break:

  • Hardware on the 13th of February (Internet downtime might occur).
  • Software (setup of Cloud filter that will bring simplified and faster reporting as well as external monitoring of school devices*) on the 14th of February. No downtime expected at this stage.

* The DfE requires all school owned devices and all users to be monitored at all times.
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/meeting-digital-and-technology-standards-in-schools-and-colleges/filtering-and-monitoring-standards-for-schools-and-colleges

School laptops will therefore also be monitored at home. Laptops are currently being managed in multiple ways, but as we are moving everything to Microsoft Intune, they will all be cloud managed for web filtering.