Businesses Increasingly Turn to SurfWatch Software to Enhance Productivity, Limit Liability and Preserve Bandwidth.

Business Editors/Hi-Tech Writers

LOS GATOS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 6, 2000

1999 Shows Increase in Number of Companies Managing Employee

Access to the Net

Internet filtering pioneer Surfwatch Software, a division of JSB Software Technologies plc (EASDAQ: JSBS/London: JSB), announced today that more than ever companies are using filtering software such as SurfWatch Professional Edition to ensure that their employees are using the Internet for work-related activities.

Initially a popular software to protect children from the `dark side' of the Internet, SurfWatch Software is now being used by corporate managers as an effective tool to enhance productivity, preserve bandwidth, and limit corporate legal liability.

As a result of this shift, more than 74 percent of SurfWatch Software's sales in 1999 were to the corporate market, as opposed to 1998 figures that showed that the majority of the company's sales were to the home and education markets.

This dramatic shift highlights the increase in the number of companies that provide their employees with Internet access. In fact, it is estimated that corporations now spend more than $3.5 billion annually to make certain that their employees have access to the immense knowledge and power of the Internet.

The areas of greatest growth in corporate sales during the past year were to the high tech and computer related industries, followed by financial services, including insurance companies and banks. In addition, there was an increase in the sale of site licenses which cover 10,000 users or more indicating that the nation's largest companies are recognizing the need to manage Internet access.

"To help meet the diverse needs of small and large businesses in different industries, SurfWatch customizes its filtering software to meet the unique goals of individual companies and their workforce," said Alexandra Salomon, Director of Content Management for SurfWatch Software.

"Our products enable companies to choose between monitoring or filtering and to generate a variety of different reports to get a better understanding of how their network is being used."

To help employers determine how their employees are using the Internet during office hours, SurfWatch developed CheckNet, a free, confidential web-based service that analyzes a company's web traffic to determine how the Internet is being used in the workplace.

CheckNet evaluates visited web sites against 21 site categories, such as entertainment, sexually explicit, sports, investment and others that might not be job related.

According to Salomon, "The most recent CheckNet analysis of American workers' Web surfing habits shows that more than $1 billion each year is being wasted on recreational surfing." The CheckNet data also shows that nearly one-third of employees' Internet surfing at the office is focused on visits to non-work related sites such as general news, investment, sexually explicit, travel and entertainment sites.

"Corporations need to recognize that as the Internet continues to grow, businesses will lose money unless they adopt appropriate tools to manage access," Salomon added. "With its monitoring and filtering capabilities, SurfWatch Professional Edition enables companies to manage access to the Internet as they would any other business asset."

The dramatic shift in sales to the corporate market does not mean that parents and teachers are no longer using SurfWatch Software to protect their children online. In 1999, more than 100 Internet Service Providers (ISPs) chose to integrate SurfWatch Software into their own services in order to distinguish their products as providing filtered access to the Net.

"The fact is that today more people are accessing our filtering products than ever before and that includes the corporate, home and education markets," Salomon concluded.

Companies seeking to know if they are making the most of their web resources can receive a confidential CheckNet analysis of their log files without charge or download a trial version of SurfWatch Professional Edition at http://www.surfwatch.com.

About SurfWatch

SurfWatch provides leading content management solutions for information appliances, Internet services, and large networks. Providing the only patented filtering technology available, SurfWatch products block content in five core filtering categories (sexually explicit, violence, hate speech, drugs/alcohol, and gambling).

It also empowers parents to block children from chat rooms - one of the most dangerous places on line for youth - via the ChatBlock(TM) feature that blocks access to Web-based chat sites and Internet Relay Chat Servers, where most of the unmonitored chat traffic occurs.

SurfWatch software filters the World Wide Web, Internet, FTP, Gopher and Web-based chat connections. SurfWatch integrated services also provide Internet filtering for homes through Web security software kits, ISPs, and search engines.

SurfWatch works with a wide range of strategic partners, including Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO), Disney (NYSE: DIS), AT&T (NYSE: T), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Alta Vista, WebTV, BigPlanet, Netscape (NASDAQ: NCSP), Worldtalk (NASDAQ: WTLK), Excite@Home (NASDAQ: ATHM), and WorldGate (NASDAQ: WGAT).

About JSB

JSB Software Technologies PLC is a specialist developer and provider of innovative networking and connectivity software aimed at enhancing user productivity.

In addition to SurfWatch, the company has two other divisions:

-- The surfCONTROL Division (http://www.surfcontrol.com) hosts a comprehensive line of Internet monitoring, management and filtering products

-- The MultiView Division (http://www.multiview.jsb.com) develops and markets software products for networking desktop Microsoft Windows PCs to UNIX Open Systems servers.

JSB's products are sold worldwide through direct sales and a network of distributors, VARs and OEMs.

SurfWatch is a registered trademark of SurfWatch Software, a division of JSB Software Technologies plc.