Content Filtering

Dashboard Location: Security and SD-WAN > Configure > Content Filtering

Content filtering in Meraki appliances provides comprehensive web security and access control through intelligent URL categorization, pattern matching, and policy enforcement. This functionality enables organizations to maintain security compliance, control internet access, and protect against malicious content while supporting productivity requirements. Content filtering integrates with Meraki’s threat intelligence to provide real-time protection against emerging threats and supports granular policy creation for different user groups and network segments.

Example-1: The example below demonstrates content filtering configuration using tested YAML configuration from pipeline fixtures.

meraki:
  domains:
    - name: "!env domain"
      administrator:
        name: "!env org_admin"
      organizations:
        - name: "!env org"
          networks:
            - name: "!env network_name"
              product_types:
                - appliance
                - switch
                - wireless
                - camera
                - sensor
                - cellularGateway
              appliance:
                content_filtering:
                  allowed_url_patterns:
                    - "www.cisco.com"
                    - "*.meraki.com"
                  blocked_url_patterns:
                    - "www.abc.com"
                    - "*.abc.com"
                  blocked_url_categories:
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/C122"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/C121"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/C84"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/T01"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/T02"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/T04"
                    - "meraki:contentFiltering/category/T06"
                  url_category_list_size: fullList

The list of category IDs along with their names can be obtained via an API call with a GET action to the following endpoint, where networkId corresponds to the ID of a Meraki network defined within your organization.

https://api.meraki.com/api/v1/networks/{networkId}/appliance/contentFiltering/categories

Documentation regarding the API endpoint can be found at the following URL:

https://developer.cisco.com/meraki/api-v1/get-network-appliance-content-filtering-categories/

In order to ease the deployment of content filtering the following table has been created from the response of the API endpoint as of 28/08/2025.

The mapping of category names to IDs is not expected to change often.