In my last post, I wrote about a tool I’m creating called Faro. I implied what Faro is, but I’ll provide more clarity in this post.

What is Faro?

Faro is a multi-functional tool with the primary purpose of blocking sexually explicit content from users’ devices.

It achieves this through

1. DNS Filtering
2. Screen Monitoring
3. Personal Accountability

I’ll walk through how each of these will be achieved.

1. DNS Filtering

The Faro client software will act as a gatekeeper through which all DNS traffic must pass. This is the first line of defense against problematic content. Blocked sites can be configured by Personal Administrators.

2. Screen Monitoring

Faro will periodically take a screenshot of the user’s device. This screenshot will then be locally processed by a machine learning model that will scan the image for explicit content. If the model is beyond a certain confidence level, it will send a report to Accountability Partners and send a highly blurred version of the problematic screenshot to the connected instance. This screenshot can be reviewed by Accountability Partners, who can determine if it really is problematic and react accordingly.

3. Personal Accountability

Although explored last, Personal Accountability is arguably the most important step toward freedom that Faro can assist in.

The accountability system for Faro is simple. Within an instance, a user can be a recipient of DNS Filtering and Screen Monitoring. A user can also be an Accountability Partner. A user does not need to have DNS Filtering and Screen Monitoring enabled to be an Accountability Partner and/or a Personal Administrator.¹ Additionally, a user can hold these roles in relation to multiple other users.

Accountability Partners

An Accountability Partner can check in with a user and will recieve alerts for any flagged content. This should prompt them to reach out to the user, and aids in accountability that is external to the Faro platform.

Personal Administrators

Personal Administrators are in charge of configuring a user’s filter settings.

Through these roles, we hope to increase person-to-person accountability.

Conclusion

I hope this provides clarity toward the functionality of Faro.