Activated Categorization Is Disabled Hot - Kerio Control Web Filter Is Not

If the local database is corrupted, the service may start but categorization remains disabled.

Method 1: Via Web Interface (if option exists in your version) Go to Configuration → Web Filter → Update → Clear Cache or Reset Database.

Method 2: Manual (SSH/Console) Stop the filtering service:

/etc/init.d/kerio-filtering stop

Remove the cache directory:

rm -rf /var/kerio/kerio-control/cache/urlfilter/

Restart the service:

/etc/init.d/kerio-filtering start

The service will re-download category data from GFI (may take 5–15 minutes).

When you see “Web filter is not activated” or “Categorization is disabled” in Kerio Control (now GFI Kerio Control), it means the URL filtering feature cannot check websites against its cloud-based category database. Without categorization, the firewall cannot block or allow sites based on content type (e.g., social media, adult content, streaming). If the local database is corrupted, the service

This typically happens because:

If tests fail:

When categorization is disabled, Kerio Control cannot assign a category to any requested URL. Consequently: Restart the service: /etc/init

In most configurations, this leads to either:

When managing web traffic filtering in Kerio Control, you may encounter the following status indicators:

As a result, web filtering rules based on URL categories (e.g., Social Media, Streaming, Adult Content) will not work. Users may be able to access all websites regardless of configured policies. As a result

Kerio caches category data locally. If the cache database becomes corrupted (e.g., after an unclean shutdown or power outage), the service refuses to start.