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DNSFilter Data Examines Companies’ Evolving Policies on Content Blocking

June 10, 2025 - Organizations are increasingly using content filtering not just to thwart security threats, but also to increase workplace productivity and enforce compliance. That's according to new analysis from DNSFilter examining data collected from its DNS content filtering and threat-blocking platform. The findings highlight how web content filtering policies are evolving, as well as which categories organizations block most frequently. 

One notable trend is that more companies are currently focused on blocking employees from accessing adult content and illegal torrenting sites on the internet, although corporate policies have evolved over the past year.  

Among the findings:

• Blocking adult content is one of the most common goals of organization's content filtering and blocking policies: An examination of what companies are looking to block (outside of security threats) shows that adult content is present in over 84% of those policies; the P2P (peer-to-peer) and illegal category, which contains things like torrenting sites, followed closely behind with inclusion in 81% of policies. By contrast, the terrorism and hate category is blocked by close to 66% of companies, with gambling present in 51% of companies' content filtering policies.

• Policy creators are cracking down on access to “Self-harm” content: “Self-harm” sites have become a bigger focus for organizations; in fact, this category showed up in 234% more policies in 2025 than in the prior year. 

• Access to terrorism-related content is a growing concern:  While the terrorism and hate category is currently only included in about two-thirds of companies' blocking policies, that represents more than a 5% increase compared to last year.

• More policies are concerned with dating sites than weapons-related sites: Dating and personal sites are blocked by nearly 37% of policies, while weapons are included in 35%. This could indicate that dating and personal ad sites are seen as a bigger distraction for employees during the workday.
  
  
• Certain categories are decreasing in importance: Search engines appeared in almost 19% fewer policies than they did in February 2024, while alcohol and tobacco were in 10% fewer polices.  We've also seen that ads are becoming a less frequently blocked category, likely because so many websites today depend on ads and trackers in order to operate. 

These findings underscore the growing importance of adaptive content policies to balance security, compliance and workforce efficiency. Organizations can gain insights into shifting web usage patterns to update filtering policies effectively.

TK Keanini, CTO, DNSFilter, said: “Organizations are getting more nuanced in how they manage access to online content, because they understand that not all of the internet should be accessible to their users. Blocking threats is obvious, but these findings reinforce the idea that web filtering is no longer just a security function; it's becoming a key productivity and compliance tool.”

DNSFilter solutions are available in UK through Simple IT Distribution LTD, DNSFilter Partner in the UK.

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