ContentAudit 2004

ContentAudit, how good is it?. This review site was created to answer that question. As a technology professional with 25 years of experience, I have a good understanding of how ContentAudit works. For starters, there are over 26 million people worldwide that haveused ContentAudit!

ContentAudit - Is it safe?

ContentAudit is a program that just reads text in files looking for potentially objectionable material.  It does not delete anything on your computer.  It does not alter any files on your computer.  It does not download any pornography or pornography links to your computer.  It is a very safe program.  A small executable file is placed on your computer and automatically reads every file on your hard drive.  These files include all documents, web pages, history files, and cookies.  ContentAudit doesn’t interpret graphics of an objectionable nature.  The purpose of this content auditing tool is identify possibly objectionable and controversial topics including pornography, drugs, violence, crimes, gambling, suicide, and firearms, just to mention a few.  Everyone does not view all of these topics as objectionable, but there may be concerns in the home or business based on personal circumstances.

ContentAudit - Does the program work?

The program works as designed.  ContentAudit evaluates the text against a list of words and phrases that may be objectionable.  What is objectionable to one person may be perfectly acceptable to another person.  The content audit is meant to identify potential problems.  Most of the operating system files that may have an objectionable word as part of the file name have been identified to be excluded as part of the results of the content audit.   Most computers will have a very small number of files that might be identified as possibly objectionable when in reality there is nothing wrong with them.  This is known as a false-positive.  It is easy to look at these files to see if there really is a problem.  Most people are using the product to find out if their child or spouse has been looking at pornography.  In most cases, if there is a pornography problem in the home or work it could potentially find hundreds or thousands of possible files.

ContentAudit - How does the process work?

To begin the content audit process, you have to start the audit at http://www.contentwatch.com/products/contentaudit.php.  You are then asked to enter your email address.  Next, you are prompted for acceptance of the standard Microsoft Security window because of the Active-x component in the ContentAudit.  This is where most people get a little nervous.  There is nothing to be afraid of at this point.  ContentAudit has to place a small executable on your computer to do the test.   After accepting the Microsoft Security window, it only takes a short amount of time to download the executable program.  This download is done automatically for you.  This can take anywhere from a couple of seconds to a couple of minutes depending on your connection speed.  Once the program is downloaded, you have to start the program by clicking on the “start” button.  At this point the program begins execution on your computer.  Depending on the number of files, memory size, and CPU, it can take anywhere from a couple of minutes to 10-20 minutes to complete a content audit.  You have an idea of how long it is going to take because of the progress bar.  Once the audit is completed, you can view the display to see what potential problems might be lurking on your computer.  Files highlighted in red have a higher probability of being objectionable.  Often the question gets asked, what do I do if I discover a problem?  There is no easy answer.  Solutions range from installing software to prevent the problem, setting up parental controls in the home, and in the worst cases seeking professional help. 

ContentAudit - Is it free?

ContentAudit is offered as a free tool to help determine if there is a potential problem in the home or at work.  You can use the product as many times as you like or pass it around to your friends and neighbors.  Obviously ContentWatch has a number of products and solutions that help with potential problems discovered by ContentAudit.  These products range from tools which cleanup the objectionable content in the short run to products which provide a long-term solution such as Internet filters, email filters, and monitoring tools.

ContentAudit - Should I use it?

It is a very good tool to determine if you may have problems on your computer.  Performing a content audit will not hurt anything on your computer. If you want to try ContentAudit, click on either of the flashing images.  

I hope this information has been helpful to anyone looking to identify possibly objectionable material on a computer. You can reach me, Jerry Ropelato, at jerry@contentauditreview.com. You can also see a side-by-side review of the Top 10 Internet filters at http://www.internetfilterreview.com/.