URL filtering - proper format of URLs in the block list

[Eugene_Alejandro]

Hello everyone,

Blocking the URL below would be in the right format? Without the http:// or https://

www.spotify.com/sg-en/download/other

It just got me confused a bit with the "TIP" displayed in the URL Filtering Profile screen, putting a slash at the end would match www.example.com/test; where the user only wants to block www.example.com.

The tip says:

 Use separators to specify match criteria - for example, "www.example.com/" will match "www.example.com/test" but not match "www.example.com.hk"

Please share your thoughts and thank you.

[jsalmans]

I believe your Spotify example is in the proper format and would block anything at that directory level or under it.

It should not, however, block anything higher such as www.spotify.com/sg-en/download or www.spotify.com itself.

The tip example I think is mostly about dealing with the domain names themselves.  Since it seems like it is basically just a match with an assumed wildcard at the end, if you don't add the "/" to "www.example.com" then you'd block ANY directories under that domain but you'd also block that domain with other country codes (just like their example that uses the Hong Kong ".hk" country code).  Adding the "/" tells it you want to block directories under "www.example.com" but still allow access to that domain using other country codes such as "www.example.com.hk".

To use that example further, I imagine you could block "www.example.com." which would block any domain with that name that uses a country code but still allow access to www.example.com and all of its directories.

[Eugene_Alejandro]

Hey @jsalmans thanks a lot for your elaborate insights about my question.

I just blocked it with this format *.spotify.com and it also blocked all other sub-directories under that root website.

Thanks again.