Safe Exam Browser is a web browser environment that allows digital tests carried out safely. Safe Exam Browser software turns any computer temporarily into a secure workstation. It controls and restricts access to system functions, other websites and applications and prevents unauthorised resources from being used during an exam.
When enabled, the settings set on an institutional level are set for the assignment. However, Safe Exam Browser can be configured from within your digital test. The available options in the Ans interface are Quit Safe Exam Browser, Allowed versions and Browser Exam Keys, and more settings can be adjusted with a configuration file. With the configuration file, it is also possible to adjust, for example, which special and function keys are allowed to be used, which settings are allowed to be shown on the dock/taskbar, which processes are enabled and disabled while Safe Exam Browser is active and options to configure multiple behaviours of the system.
Safe Exam Browser does not support playing .mp4 videos. We recommend to use .webm, so the videos can be viewed.
To configure Safe Exam Browser from within your digital test, follow the steps below.
- Navigate to your assignment.
- Click settings Settings in the menu at the top.
- Click the tab Integrations in the menu on the left.
- Click Enable next to Safe Exam Browser.
- Configure the settings that apply.*
*Configuring with a configuration file is described in the Configuration section below.
Safari version 17 is the minimum requirement needed in order to run Safe Exam Browser on macOS.
Versions older than macOS Ventura (version 13) are not supported.
error_outline For macOS, Safe Exam Browser version 3.4.1 is the recommended version to be used in combination with Ans. For Windows, Safe Exam Browser version 3.8.0 is the recommended version to be used in combination with Ans. Later versions of Safe Exam Browser on macOS and Windows have not been tested and do not ensure correct and stable functionality of Safe Exam Browser.
You can read more about Safe Exam Browser specifications here.
Safe Exam Browser integration's interface on Ans
Configuration
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Download configuration
If you click Download, the Safe Exam Browser configuration will be downloaded and you can use it to modify settings in SEB and/or in other digital tests. -
Upload configuration
Click Upload to upload your own configuration. The uploaded configuration must be unencrypted.
Configuring with the configuration file
The different configuration settings that are available in Safe Exam Browser and how to apply them are described below.
- Download the configuration file.
- Open the Safe Exam Browser application.
- Open Settings from the top toolbar.
- Click on the Config File tab.
- Open the downloaded file via Open Settings....*
- Make the desired changes.
- Go back to the Config File tab.
- Click Save Settings or Save Settings As... (if asked, save as "unencrypted").
- Quit Safe Exam Browser.
- Upload the configuration file on Ans.
*If the window is not visible (popped and disappeared), you can select it via the Windows tab in the top toolbar.
More information on different settings available in SEB can be found in the Safe Exam Browser website.
Special and function keys
Configure which special and function keys are allowed to be used. For example, if participants are allowed to have multiple tabs open, you can check the 'Alt tab' so they can easily switch between tabs.
Dock/taskbar
Configure which settings are allowed to be shown on Safe Exam Browser dock/taskbar. Safe Exam Browser dock/taskbar is displayed at either the bottom or top of the page, depending on the operating system.
Please note that ‘Navigation buttons’ only work if the ‘Reload button’ is also enabled (not the other way around). We do not recommend using the navigation buttons, as Safe Exam Browser does not send their configuration key when using 'page_back'. This means participants will receive the error 'incorrect configuration detected' and they will need to go to the home page and go to resume test.
Speech-to-text (macOS only)
If enabled, dictation needs to be set up and can be invoked with the shortcut set in System Preferences/Keyboard/Dictation (default: press fn twice). If not enabled and configured in System Preferences but enabled in SEB settings, SEB will try to switch on enhanced dictation which works offline without sending speech audio to Apple's servers.
URL filtering
If 'Enable URL filtering' is checked without extra filters, then every URL except for Ans' URLs will be blocked. You can configure which URLs are allowed by clicking ADD URL FILTER. You can then fill in the URLs you want to allow. To allow subdomains of an URL, add "/*" at the end of the URL.
If 'Enable URL filtering' is not checked at all (or it is but without any extra filters), the participant is able to open a website from within an open question or the Digital Notes (when turned on).
Files (macOS only)
If 'Allow downloading and uploading files is checked, then participants are allowed to download and upload files during the test. After checking the box 'Allow downloading and uploading files, you can configure how uploading and downloading files will be handled.
- Open download file
- Search for a file, if not found, it will open the download file so you can search
- Try searching for the file. If the file is not found, you will receive an error
Permitted Processes
Configure which processes are allowed to continue running while Safe Exam browser is active. To allow certain applications to run during the test, you can enable them here. Permitted applications are automatically started when entering the Safe Exam Browser. Additional information: In SEB this is a checkbox that can be enabled/disabled per permitted process. In Ans this setting is enabled for every permitted process. You can read more about this option at Safeexambrowser.org.
Prohibited Processes
Configure which processes are disabled/blocked while Safe Exam browser is active. You can read more about this option at Safeexambrowser.org.
Link behaviour
This option is used if links are included in your digital test. By clicking the dropdown menu, you can configure the behaviour of the system when opening links.
As navigation buttons are not enabled by default, we recommend selecting 'Links open in a new window'. If you select 'Links open in the same window' and participants open a link to a new website, they cannot go back to Ans.
View behaviour
By clicking the dropdown menu, you can configure how Safe Exam Browser will be viewed.
- Use browser window - Opens the window, while still displaying the bar at the top, with limited options.
- Use full-screen mode - Full screen, without the top bar.
- Touch optimised.
Quit Safe Exam Browser
If 'Allow participants to quit Safe Exam Browser' is checked, you can leave the field empty or enter a password that participants can use to quit Safe Exam Browser. If this option is not checked, participants can only exit Safe Exam Browser after they have submitted their test.
Allowed versions
Configure which version of Safe Exam Browser can be used. To allow all versions, you can leave the boxes empty. You can specify the version with semantic versioning major.minor.patch. For example, if the current version of Safe Exam Browser for Windows is 3.3.2 you can do the following:
- 3 which will allow all versions starting with major 3 to be used (3.1.1, 3.3.2 and 3.4.0)
- 3.3 which will allow all patch versions of 3.3 to be used (3.3.1, 3.3.2 and 3.3.3)
- 3.3.2 which will only allow this specific version
If you wish to restrict the usage of a particular operating system, you can specify an invalid version. For instance, if you want to disallow participants from using an iOS device, you can designate the allowed version as 'x'.
error_outline Click Update to save the configuration setting.
Browser Exam Key
With the Browser Exam Key you can verify that your students are using the correct version and configuration of the Safe Exam Browser. This provides additional security to prevent students from using a custom build of the Safe Exam Browser.
The usage of the Browser Exam Key is optional. If you do not add any Browser Exam Keys in Ans, the Safe Exam Browser integration will skip the Browser Exam Key verification.
Keep in mind that the Browser Exam Key is platform and version specific. If you want students to be able to use macOS and Windows x32 and x64, you will need to retrieve the Browser Exam Key from all these platforms before starting the test.
More information about Browser Exam Keys can be found here.
To retrieve the Browser Exam Key for Windows, follow the steps below.
- Set all configuration settings and click on Update.
- Download the configuration by clicking on Download from the Configuration section.
- Open the SEB configuration tool on Windows and make sure you use the latest version or the version you want your students to use.
- Open the downloaded ans_seb_config.seb file in the SEB configuration tool and resave the config. SEB will add some additional settings which are needed to correctly verify the Browser Exam Key.
- Upload the newly saved config in Ans. Do not make any changes to the configuration as that will change the Browser Exam Key.
- Download the configuration by clicking on Download from the Actions section again.
- Open the SEB configuration tool on Windows and open the downloaded configuration file. Go to the "Exam" tab and copy the Browser Exam Key which is a 64 character long string
- Open the Browser Exam Keys collapsible and click on add browser exam key. Add the copied 64 character long Browser Exam Key in the input field and click on Update.
- Repeat steps 7 and 8 in another version of Windows if you want to support both x32 and x64.
To allow students to use both Windows and macOS, you must also retrieve the Browser Exam Key from a macOS device. Make sure not to make any changes to the configuration as that will invalidate the Browser Exam Key for Windows.
To retrieve the Browser Exam Key for macOS, follow the steps below.
- Download the configuration by clicking on Download from the Configuration section or use the configuration file downloaded in step 6 on Windows if you want to support both Windows and macOS.
- Open the Safe Exam Browser on macOS while holding done the alt/option key. This will open the local client Settings. Make sure you use the latest version or the version you want your students to use.
- Open the downloaded ans_seb_config.seb file in the local client settings. Go to the "Exam" tab and copy the Browser Exam Key which is a 64 character long string.
- Open the Browser Exam Keys collapsible and click on add browser exam key. Add the copied 64 character long Browser Exam Key in the input field and click on Update.
- Repeat step 2 to 4 in every version of Safe Exam Browser on macOS if you want to allow students to use multiple versions.
Danger zone
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Remove Safe Exam Browser
If you click Remove, the Safe Exam Browser integration is removed from your digital test. Participants can then access the test without Safe Exam Browser.
Enable Safe Exam Browser for your publication
After your digital test has been taken, you can create a publication in order for participants to view their results. You can read more about publishing your results here.
To enable Safe Exam Browser for your publication, you must enable Safe Exam Browser for your digital test first. If Safe Exam Browser is enabled for your digital test, this will automatically secure your publication with Safe Exam Browser. No further settings need to be configured in the publication settings.
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