Layer 7 Website Blocking Using MikroTik Router

Dear Readers

I am glad to have you updated every month by sharing with you my experiences, challenges and how I go about resolving them.

A week ago, one of our valuable clients (USAID Liberia Strategic Analysis/Social Impact) whom we’re providing internet services as well as IT equipment, complained that they have been going through tough times relating to their internet speed and bandwidth consumption. Every other time we will receive a call or email about this issue. So we first came up with a suggestion that all users be managed on the network by creating a queue and allocating an amount of bandwidth to each user in the router. This method was applied for a while but they changed their mind again saying that they do not want to restrict user’s bandwidth. So, as a tech support and you have to be creative and come up with suggestions that will best suit your client in order to maintain the business relationship.

Since we have provided this solution, they have not called or complained. So I think this was a brilliant idea. They already have an in-house IT officer. We decided to conduct a free training lesson for their IT person on how to use the ‘MIKROTIK’ device which is very easy to configure and is extremely user friendly.

We arranged an appointment to come over and have him trained.

They agreed and the next day I was at their office. I downloaded the latest version on MikroTik software called Winbox that is used to login any MikroTik devices and installed it on his laptop.

We logged into the Core router using this software.

These are the few steps to follow, as listed below.

1.        Open winbox and login with login name and password
2.        On the left hand Conner, click ‘’IP’’ and select ‘’Firewall’’
3.        In firewall, select ‘’Layer 7 protocols’’ and click on the (+) symbol

In the dialog box, fill the name space with the website you wish to block and write this script in the ‘’Regexp: space’’ ^.+(youtube.com).*$ and do this for all websites click on ‘’Apply’’ and ‘’Ok’’.

4.   To make this work on the network, in the same ‘’Firewall" menu, click on: Filter Rules > + > Advanced > Layer 7 protocol to select the website you just added and click OK. In the same menu click “Action’’ and select “drop’’ and “Apply’’.

5.   Reboot the system/router to make changes effective.

Now you are done! Open a web browser test the website you just block.

It should give you an error that saying ‘’ this site cannot be found’’!

The client was well satisfied and happy with the training.

I am not a MikroTik Certified Network Administrator (MTCNA) yet but I can say I am proud of myself and many thanks to NATC, were I started off as an IT Trainee. I am planning to write MTCNA exams soon anyways. Being in the field has brought me close to learning lot of new things every day.

I hope this will guide you through in resolving such problem if you are new to MikroTik systems.

Prepared by:

Daniel W. Collins

Senior IT Technician

NATC

End of Year Blog Post

Hey everyone, 

Happy New Year! The year 2016 was such an incredible and amazing one and I enjoyed every moment relating to my work experience and profession as well as my colleagues. It was a year that brought me close to taking responsibilities and working independently even when there were ups and downs. 

When I read through all of my posts over the years, I felt so proud of myself even as I speak and it encourages me to keep my head up, for there are lot of good things in store for me as I have entered the new year and will continue to work towards it.  

Working as an IT technician, it is a day-to-day activity of taking care of clients IT related needs. Let me share with you what I experienced a few days ago after one of our clients returned from their holiday break. 

They purchased a new Canon Image Runner (IR 2520) printer which I setup and installed on every user's desktop and PC. After connecting every user to print over the network, I went back the next morning to continue with the scanning function but to my utmost surprise after restarting the printer it requested for "department user ID & password" which I don’t remember setting up.   

This is how I went out resetting the printer to factory reset:

1. Power on the printer

2. Hold on the "AR strict" key (Looks like an Asterisk sign) and hit 2 and 8 at the same time 

3. Scroll to "System" and select reset "Card" 

The printer initialized and restarted by itself then I reconfigured the network settings by assigning a static IP address of 192.168.11.13 and on each desktop and PC this address was configured in the printer port. 

The next step was to download and configure the "Network Scangear Tool". This tool allows you to scan a document from the printer to a computer over the network.  I then used the "Microsoft Fax&Scan" option and demonstrated it to all the client's staff and taught them how to use the function. 

They are glad that NATC finds a solution for all their IT problems. 

Daniel W Collins, 

Senior IT Technician        

End of the year Blog Post

I am Louise W. Gray Office Manager of New Africa Technology Company for the past two (2) months.

My experience with New Africa Technology Company is great and quite different from my last place of work and I love it so much.

I am getting familiar with technical work because this is what we are into.

New Africa is really the best IT company in Liberia. We give out Wide Area Connectivity, Local Area Network, Technical Support, Network Security, Services and Maintenance, Supplies of IT Equipment, VSAT ISP and Wireless fibers and more. 

The most amazing experience is that, the day to day transactions can be collected either from the general ledger or the company;s WhatsApp channel. Every employee will have to get online as often as possible so as to get the daily happenings in and out of the office.

What interests me most is that I am the Office Manager /Accountant. My Responsibility is straightly financial work and office upkeep. But can you imagine, I was in the office one day and a client brought in a laptop for repairs, all our technical staffs had gone on site and I was the only one at the office. I received the item and made a delivery note and the client went away. After some hours, Rita who is one of our technical staff came and I told her about the laptop and give her the form that I filled to receive the laptop.

She smiled and said “You should have filled the Equipment Pickup form instead of Delivery note form." She went on to explain that the Delivery Note will only be used when we are returning the item to the client after we must have solved the problem for which they brought it.

I grabbed the idea and was wishing for a day to come that no technical staff will be around then I will applied what I learned from Rita. After some weeks another client came and I used the Equipment Pickup Form to collect the item from him.

The whole logic behind this scenario is that, I am the office Manager and Accountant but I also feel happy to learn other things outside my job experience.

Finally, like I told you before in my Introductory Post, that my main objective is to move New Africa Technology Company Reports from Excel to QuickBooks.

My Bosses had given me the opportunity to achieve this goal by hiring a consultant who did our QuickBooks software setup and is conducting an excessive training on how to operate my financials in QuickBooks and generate my reports. I have devoted my time from 5pm -7:30pm every day after work.

Presently I am 90%  done because we are reviewing all the reports and making sure that our balances are up to date and I am very happy that I am making progress and very soon my goal will be accomplished.

I want to appreciate the New Africa Technology Company family for believing in me and giving me this great opportunity in making this dream come true.

OMG! There is a cockroach in this Printer!

OMG! There is a cockroach in this Printer! 

Yesterday a printer HP M1132 comes in from PSI for repairing. 

Problem: Scanner Error 52.0 shows on screen and all lights of the printer continue to blink. 

Today I removed the DC Board and Power Supply Board of the printer for diagnostics and resolution of the problem. When I opened power board, to my surprise I noted that inside of the board a dead cockroach was stuck. 

1 diode, 1 resistor were compromised due to a short circuit caused by the bodily fluids of the creature. 

The DC board that controls the scanner was affected due to the power supply board issue. A cockroach is not known to chew on electronic wires as such. But, sometimes, but very rarely, a cockroach’s faeces or urine could potentially harm the electronics. Cleaning these devices to remove dead roaches, eggs and faeces is what we do during preventive maintenance. 

We always unplug appliances before we attempt to clean them, and do not use water or liquid cleaners on electronics or electrical appliances. Brushes, compressed air and soft cloths work well to clean electronics. Some small bugs can potentially damage expensive components. 

We need regular and proper maintenance of our equipment.  

Hope you enjoyed reading the blog post of mine. Your comments are welcome please.   

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          Regards,  Farman Elahi 

IT Technician        

Season's Greetings from NATC