Web Filtering for MSPs (Part 1): Why Web Filtering is so Important

A web filtering service allows Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to better protect their clients from accidental malware downloads and phishing attacks while improving their bottom lines. Further, by preventing phishing attacks and malware infections, they can reduce the amount of time they spend fighting fires. For busy MSPs, the latter will be especially beneficial.

Why is Web Filtering Important?

There are several reasons why MSP clients will benefit from a web filtering service. First and foremost, a web filter will help to prevent their customers’ employees from visiting phishing websites and malicious URLs. Most phishing attacks start with a phishing email, so a powerful spam filtering solution is essential. While commercial spam filters such as SpamTitan will block more than 99% of spam and phishing emails, additional protections are required to protect against the 1% that bypass spam defenses.

Naturally end user security awareness training will help in this regard, but as the 2018 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report shows, 30% of delivered phishing messages are opened by end users and 12% of those users also click on malicious links in the messages.

A web filter is an additional layer of anti-phishing and anti-malware defenses that kicks in when malicious links are clicked and when end users attempt to visit other malicious sites while browsing the Internet. With a web filter in place, when an employee attempts to access a malicious web page, that attempt will be blocked before any content is downloaded. Instead of displaying the web page, a block page will be displayed.

Web filters also allow companies to carefully control the types of content their employees can access. This allows them to enforce acceptable internet usage policies with ease. Employers can prevent their employees from accessing NSFW content such as pornography, illegal content and, if tighter controls are required to improve productivity, other categories of web content such as dating sites, social media networks, gambling sites, and gaming sites.

With a web filter in place, security and productivity can both be quickly improved and the gains in both of those areas is likely to more than pay for the cost of the web filtering package provided by their MSP.

Cloud Based Web Filtering Solutions for MSPs

Convincing customers to implement a web filtering solution should be straightforward given the number of phishing attacks that are now being conducted and the cost of mitigating phishing attacks and malware infections. The cost of web filtering is tiny by comparison.

For MSPs, cloud-based filtering solutions are the natural choice. They can be implemented in minutes once a customer request has been received, no hardware is required, there is no software to install, and patching is handled by the service provider. All that is required from the MSP is a brief set up and configuration for each customer and ongoing management and reporting.

However, not all cloud-based web filtering solutions make set up, management and reporting simple. WebTitan Cloud differs in this respect. Not only does the solution offer excellent protection, the solution has been developed specifically with MSPs in mind. The ease of integration into MSP’s back-end systems and management has made WebTitan Cloud the go-to web filtering solution for MSPs.

In our next post we will explain how WebTitan Cloud differs from other web filtering solutions, why it is the easiest solution for MSPs to integrate into their existing cloud offerings, and how TitanHQ makes getting started, provisioning new customers, and managing customer accounts a quick and easy process requiring the minimal management overhead.

Click here for Web Filtering for MSPs (Part 2)

