Frequently Asked Questions

Easy, it only takes two clicks

Right click on "My Computer" (Windows 7) or "This PC" (Windows 10). Click "Properties".

If the window that pops up says 64-bit or x64 operating system, you're golden.

Deauthorize the device & Uninstall

We don't provide a way to recover your local passwords. That's because such functionality would required a backdoor in our software, something we will never do.

If you're running a trial and this happens, unfortunately there just isn't anything that can be done, except to wait out the trial period and then uninstall.

If you're running a paid version of Citadel, you can deauthorize the device by logging into the website. There's a video tutorial in our help section on how to do this.

After you've deauthorized the device, you can reboot your computer and Citadel should synchronize this license change. Once this happens, you'll be able to shut Citadel down and uninstall it. Uninstalling Citadel will purge the locally set passwords and then you can reinstall Citadel and reactivate the device.

Remember, when setting passwords, try to use a long passphrase! They're easier to remember and generally more secure. "This is my super strong password" has more than double the entrpoy (that means its better) than "my5up3rpa55w0rd!" and is much easier to remember. Of course, don't use either of these passwords since ya know, they're right here on the internet.

Nope

Short Explanation

Citadel's driver plays by the rules, other drivers tend not to. Therefore, to ensure that Citadel functions correctly, you should not be running other web filtering software together with Citadel. You may try, certainly, but this use-case is unsupported. See the long explanation below if you want to understand why.

Long Explanation

On Windows, there is a well-designed system that enables many programs like Citadel to live in harmony on your computer, so long as driver engineers follow the rules. Many don't.

Without ranting too much, here's a little background. We've had discussions directly with engineers at Antivirus companies regarding their practices when it comes to writing web scanners. Their belief is that, because their work is so super-duper-important, they cannot risk following the rules and possibly letting another program analyze web traffic. So, they demolish the insides of your operating system to make sure nobody else can work there.

Similarily, some other content filters work the same way. Imagine that inside your computer there's community mailboxes where all the millions of pieces of mail come in, and then go out. If everyone played by the rules, multiple security contractors could come along putting mail in and taking mail out and checking to ensure that everything is in order.

What these other companies do is show up to the mail boxes with a crane and swing a giant wrecking ball at them, sending mail flying everywhere after making sure that they're the only ones who know where all the now-airborne pieces of mail should go. As such, sadly, we can't possibly support a use-case where you may be running software written by one of the companies that are bad at writing software.

It's on the way

Citadel for Android and iOS have been in development along side Citadel for Desktop. Presently, all of our technology is planned to be included in our mobile version, with the possible exception of the Video Filter. We estimate Q3 2021 for the release but of course this is an estimate. Check back in soon!

Unfortunately, we do not support MacOS

A MacOS version of Citadel is not presently under development. We have had discussions with Apple engineers exploring this possibility. However, Citadel is powered at its core by an unparalleled device driver we've written, and we're not satisfied with the uncertainty of the future of MacOS API's we've been given.

These drivers take significant development effort and we simply can't invest this kind of effort when Apple engineers tell us they may render such drivers inoperable at any time in any future update without notice.

This is something we of course will continue to explore and will update everyone with any changes that may arise.

Because everything is constantly changing

As a user, you may not notice, but the entire foundation of the internet is constantly being ripped up and rebuilt. In fact all technology is.

It's very much like real-life infrastructure. The roads you drive on are constantly being patched and sometimes re-paved, new regulations and new technologies emerge that make things better and so we need to not only maintain what is there, but rebuild things sometimes to make them better.

For example, you probably didn't notice that in the last five years or so, the entire infrastructure of how your browser talks to the internet has been rebuilt from the ground-up not once, but twice. Since Citadel lives in between your browser and the rest of the internet, we need to be on top of these things to ensure we can continue to provide you with a smooth, seamless experience.

We innovate

Aside from keeping pace with paradigm shifts in infrastucture technology, we're constantly pushing the boundaries of our own technologies. For instance, we have a second generation of image and video filtering in experimental development, and are even researching audio filtering.

No-fun legal disclaimer: we hope to bring cited research to market, but these aren't promised or marketed features. Just examples of how we are ever-working to enhance and expand our services for you.

Citadel Protects Itself

Once Citadel is running, it guards itself against being tampered with or terminated using conventional security methods that are made available to it by the operating system. We did initially have the ability to prevent anyone from tampering with Citadel, even system adminstrators, but this security was scaled back because ultimately people should have control over their own device, obviously, and thus such a system is incomptaible with that simple truth.

Your Computer Is Yours

Obviously your device is yours and as such, you can ultimately, when exercising all of your authority on it, stop any program from running or working correctly. If your device account is a device administrator, then you can, with enough knowledge, ultimately break any security that any resident software could put up.

Regular Users Shouldn't Have Administrator Access

Your average user, such the accounts you log in to on Windows, should not have administrator privileges. If you're using Citadel to secure the internet at home, or an employee's computer, then those users should not be able to wield the power of a system administrator. Having your account designated an administrator means you have unlimited power and authority on the device. By simply removing administrator's rights from a user, it becomes impossible (barring a serious breach in the host operating system) for that user to tamper with Citadel, or anything else on your computer.

Remove Administrator Access - Windows 7 & 10

1 - Open the "Control Panel"

2 - Open "User Accounts"

3 - Select a user listed as an "Administrator" that shouldn't be.

4 - Click the option to change the account type.

5 - Click the option to change the account type.

If you're unable to change the type as shown above, then it's either because the account you're logged in to while trying to do this is not an administrator itself, or the account you're trying to change is the only administrator. There has to be at least one.

If it's because the only account is an administrator, then you'll want to jump back to step 3 and click the button to add a user. The wizard that pops up will guide you through that. Just make sure that when it's time to select the type, you choose "Standard User".

Regular use of a Windows computer should be done with a standard account and the administrator account should have a password on it. Whenever something only an administrator can do comes up, like installing a new program, the person who knows the administrator password should enter it when requested by the operating system and that's it.

This has essentially been a mini-guide on how to correctly work within the natural security design of Windows. Citadel is designed to do the same and is secure from tampering in these conditions.