Block Internet Radio

My suggestion would be to only open known ports on your outbound ACL on the WatchGuard.  Many of the sites use port 80, so you won't block them all, but you will block many of them.  WatchGuard actually has an article about this here:

http://www.watchguard.com/infocenter/editorial/135090.asp

If you don't want to close your outbound ACL completely and only open ports of known services, then you could block certain ports that are known to be used for audio streams.

First, check teh IANA site here:

http://www.iana.org/assignments/port-numbers

Also, check here for some common ports not listed in IANA:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_TCP_and_UDP_port_numbers

Particularly, note that the following ports should be blocked: 8000, 8888

Finally, you can check here for a list of streaming audio sites to block individual sites:

http://world.std.com/~franl/media.html

You can also monitor the access logs on the WatchGaurd to see which sites employees are visiting.

Of course there is always the option of having someone in authority draft a memo telling the employees not to visit those sites anymore.  = )

Thanks for the info. Policies are already in place. Streaming radio is coming down on port 80. I have my network as secure as possible. The only ports I have open to the outside world are http, https, dns, smtp. We just have such a slow internet connection here that as soon as 1 person starts listening, the whole company is affected.

I want this to be in the background as a fall back for the users who feel they dont have to listen to the rules. I am not in a position where I am going to be a police man about monitoring the logs, I just want to stop it once and for all. The watchguard logs, if you have not seen them before, are nothing but IP's. It is very difficult and extremely time consuming to match up the sites with the site names. I know this is a lofty goal, but I will do the best I can at finding out.

Joshlamerritt, thanks for all the links provided and the info you gave. I will look in more detail at them.

Thanks again.

I can't help with the actual question but here's an idea.  

Close your network a couple times completely and tell the employees (and the boss) it must have been a few people streaming radio or video issue. Clogged the network down so badly it crashed it.  If the boss won't discipline the lawbreakers maybe he/she will get you a faster internet connection.

You could also look at setting up a proxy server (SurfControl, etc.) to restrict outbound services.  I've setup quite a few SurfControl and N2H2 boxes to do this in School Districts and businesses.  Haven't played around with any opensource Proxies (Squid) so I don't know if it will work or not for what you are talking about, but SurfControl works great if you can afford it.  I have used SurfControl to completely block Instant Messaging, streaming audio and video, and you can block websites based on categories.

Just a thought.

The watchguard I am using is actually using surf control. I am fearful of blocking streaming audio, as I do have that choice on the watchguard, but that will block any and all streaming media, both good and bad. I cant have that. I may be just asking for something that is too difficult to do with the limitations that I am setting, but I like to have a chance to hear others opinions.

Thanks.

Have you considered blocking all streaming audio, then creating exceptions for the streaming audio that you want to allow instead of the other way around?  Seems that way would be much easier.  You could have employees request that access be allowed to certain sites, then create an exception on your WatchGuard based on whether or not the site is used for legitimate business purposes or not.

mcrossland,

Thanks for that idea. Do you notice any other websites that have streaming media blocked? If someone say is watching a webninar or something?