From Decius:

I learned today that SonicWall filters MemeStreams under the category "Hacking/Proxy Avoidance." While these are certainly topics that have been discussed here, Slashdot is not banned under this category, nor is Security Focus, from which live exploits can be downloaded for most disclosed vulnerabilities.

BlueCoat also filters MemeStreams as "unavailable;Hacking;Forum/Bulletin Boards." I have no idea what "unavailable" means. I agree with the "Forum/Bulletin Board" categorization, but again the "Hacking" category raises questions. It only makes sense if its applied consistently. I don't have access to a BlueCoat proxy to check.

Have you seen MemeStreams banned by a web filter? Do you know the vendor and category?

Several people have brought this to our attention. It's already clear that this is effecting users.

If anyone has advice about appealing to the companies providing filtering solutions, chime in...

From Decius:

If anyone has advice about appealing to the companies providing filtering solutions, chime in...

Ok, here is what I'd do right off...

This is crazy - THIS? lol A HACKER site? WTF? US? Never!
...ahem...this is a news site much like digg in apparent functionality and presentation. (On a superficial level.)

I'll try to read up and find out what I can. I did quickly find that Chris Prillo's site is also blocked. For, of all things, Mature Content. WTF
http://chris.pirillo.com/2005/01/10/sonicwall-content-filter-service/

Perhaps it is just that the techs at Sonic Wall think the best way of protecting networks is to protect their users from associating with highly technical users. lol

So it seems their filters are totally whacked, but surely they have some way of updating them.

Surely they don't expect admins everywhere to handfix their boo boos?

I've never messed with Sonicwall, (I thought those things were cheap toys, so Pix or Checkpoints for me...) I'm not sure how the filters are applied. I have a friend that has one implemented, I'll ask her. I assume it is some sort of Sonic Wall subsciption service or web push on the filtered list. WHo maintains that? That's the contact point.

If I had one of them, I'd consider it defective, lol, I'd write the attorney general in their state, and the bbb in their city. OH man that works wonders.

If a friendly request doesn't remove memestreams from the list, then perhaps it needs to be very widely blogged and posted on individual webpages, in a factual way - of how ludicrous the filters seem to be. (Finding other examples to post links to, as well.) Also product reviews...and of course...a bit of a factual, viral advertisement of how their filter system performs.

Many of us here are security consultants...we don't have to implement or advertise their stuff, do we?