How to Block Any Website On Your Computer, Phone, or Network

There are several reasons why you might want to block certain websites on
your computer. Some websites could be spreading viruses, contain explicit
content or even be trying to steal your personal data. While you may well be
more than capable of avoiding these websites, but that doesn't stand true for
every one who uses your device. In such cases, it might be best to block
certain websites.

There are different ways to go about blocking websites. You can choose to
block websites only on specific browsers, the entire operating system, or
indeed your network router. Here's how to block websites.

On your computer
If you want to control access to websites on just one machine, then you can set
up block at the operating system level. This method for blocking websites is
not too hard to configure and will work across browsers.

Windows
One of the backbones of the Internet is the DNS system that translates easy to
remember (and type) names such as www.google.com into equivalent IP
addresses (8.8.8.8). While you use DNS servers to get to websites, your
computer also has something called a HOSTS file which can have this
information stored locally. This can be used to disable access to unwanted
websites. We checked this method with both Windows 7 and Windows 8.

1. Make sure you have administrator access on your computer. Sign in to your
PC using an administrator account and go to C:\Windows\System32\drivers
\etc\

2. Double-click the file named "hosts" and select Notepad from the list of
programs to open the file. Click OK. The last two lines of your hosts file should
read "# 127.0.0.1 localhost" and "# ::1 localhost".

2a. In case you can't edit the file, you'll need to right-click the file labelled
hosts and select Properties. Click the Security tab, select the administrator
account and click Edit.

2b. In the pop-up, select the account again and check Full control. Click Apply
> Yes. Now click OK in all pop-ups.

3. At the end of the file, you can add the addresses of websites to block. To do
this, just add a line at the end of the file, with 127.0.0.1 and then the name of
the site you want to block - this will redirect the site's name to your local
computer.

4. To block Google, for example, add "127.0.0.1 www.google.com" to the end of
the file without the quote marks. You can block as many sites as you want this
way, but remember you can only add one per line.

5. Repeat this step until you've added all websites you want to block.

6. Now close the hosts file and click Save. Reboot your computer for the

changes to take effect and you'll find that all those websites are now blocked.

On your phone or tablet

iOS

Apple has some handy parental control tools that let you block certain
websites. Here's how.

1. Go to Settings > General > Restrictions.

2. Tap on Enable Restrictions. Now set a passcode for restrictions. This should
ideally be different from the passcode you use to unlock the phone.

3. After the passcode is set, scroll down and tap Websites. Here you can either
choose to limit adult content, or allow access to specific websites only.

4. In specific websites only, there's a short list of allowed websites including
Discovery Kids and Disney, but you can also add sites by tapping on Add a
Website.

5. If you tap Limit adult content, Apple blocks websites that are deemed
objectionable, but you can whitelist websites by tapping on Add a Website
under Always Allow, or blacklist them by tapping on it under Never Allow.

6. If you try to access a blocked website, you see a message telling you it is
restricted. Tap the Allow Website and key in the Restrictions passcode to open
that website.
Source:ndtv