The other day, I was using my android tablet on a public hotspot. I wanted to see if uncoveror.com was coming up correctly in mobile browsers, as I have had some trouble with that. I am not, after all, a professional web developer. I was dismayed to see that it was not coming up at all, as a filtering program called Sonicwall claimed it is adult/mature content. The Uncoveror is a journal of political satire, news parody, and comic farce. It is by no stretch of the imagination anything resembling porn. There is no way a human being reviewed my sight, and found it to be such. They probably have some banned words list that associates any version of "uncover" with nudity, or some other unfair rating method. I have probably used some words here that have run afoul of their filters again. I have found out that Sonicwall is a Dell product.
I am not amused by this one bit. Misclassifying my site could easily lead to trouble with my hosting service, who do not host the kind of thing Sonicwall is accusing me of publishing. This is defamation. My reputation is important to me, as I am sure it is to all publishers. That I why I am publicly calling them out here. Mistakes can be fixed, but far too many never should have happened in the first place. They are a result of someone not doing their job because they just do not care. In my opinion this is wanton disregard.
I cannot be the only website publisher who is having his work blacklisted in this manner. It is a good idea for anyone who publishes on the web to check their site here: Sonicwall content filtering service. If your website is misclassified, this form allegedly lets web publishers request that it be reviewed again. I am adopting a wait and see attitude.
UPDATE: The squeaky wheel gets the grease. Uncoveror.com is now classified as Category 14: Arts/Entertainment and as Category 31: Web Communications. If you prod them a bit, Sonicwall will correct their mistakes. I am relieved.