The need for organizations to monitor and control Internet usage in the workplace should be an accepted fact of doing business in a cyber-connected world. Statistics indicating that 30 to 40 percent of Internet use in the workplace is unrelated to work issues should come as no surprise. Neither should the report that 90 percent of employee computers harbor as many as 30 spyware programs. In fact, studies indicate that companies may be incurring average costs of $5,000 per year per employee in lost productivity due to Internet abuse. Other data suggest that as much as 72% of employees are downloading music and video clips, eroding bandwidth and leaving networks open to spyware and other malicious agents.

As these dramatic statistics show, the need for organizations to manage their Internet access should be a baseline requirement. But how do organizations choose from the wide range of filters available to them? Perhaps one of the first decisions they will to make is between a software-based filtering solution and dedicated filtering appliance.

Both appliance and software-based options offer standard functionality -- they monitor Internet activity, block site access, automatically enforce corporate Acceptable Usage Policy guidelines and report inappropriate behavior. However, upon closer examination, there are some important and compelling reasons to choose an appliance-based solution.

An overview of the advantages of an appliance over software when it comes to handling your organization