Why are certain websites blocked at work?

I’m guessing that you haven’t been employed yet.

Many work sites block access to anything except work related sites because employees are paid to work, not to cruise the internet.

There are also security issues and legal issues for employers concerning illegal content, etc.

To keep employees from being unproductive during work. Also to protect private information on their servers.

Companies don’t want to pay their workers to play on the internet, they want to pay them to work.

People are at work to work, not play on the internet. I’m thinking you should have experienced restriction by now.

To stop you looking at porn at work and save the company all the sexual harrasment suits.

@Lightlyseared , uhh, thanks?

Why would you think to ask? You are paid to work, not surf.
Maybe they would block Fluther if they saw the Q “what is it in the vagina that feels like a nose?”.

@Lightlyseared is not kidding about the pr0n.

In a company where nothing was blocked, I had to search Internet logs for offenders and then privately sit people down and tell them to stop visiting inappropriate sites and they could be fired it the behavior continued.

It’s a lot easier to just block sites. And services like DynDNS.com and OpenDNS.com make it very easy to block sites by category (pr0n, gambling, hate speech, etc.)

In my old job with the Navy, I let interns work on my network computer. One of them downloaded stuff that would make a sailor blush. And it was on MY computer.
I guess our IT people weren’t too militant. It went unnoticed.

Back in the olden days you were expected to work while at work, it’s making a comeback. They try to limit access to virtual playgrounds so their employees will do their jobs and not shop on E-Bay.