On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 09:30:39 -0500, Leythos wrote:

> On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 09:23:59 -0500, Michael B. Trausch wrote:
>
>> On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 09:14:14 -0500, Leythos wrote:
>>
>>> On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 09:08:00 -0500, Michael B. Trausch wrote:
>>>
>>>> All you really need are a pop-up blocker (Firefox has one built-in that is
>>>> reasonably good--and you can pretty easily get an ad-blocker for it, too,
>>>> that prevents a good deal more of crud from being able to get in), a
>>>> decent anti-virus program (AVG Free does a decent job and also detects
>>>> many types of malware), and HijackThis, which is a Windows utility to help
>>>> find things that have installed themselves into places like the Windows
>>>> registry.
>>>
>>> All you really need is to secure the machine and install a firewall for
>>> the internet connections that filters crap out of HTTP, HTTPS, SMTP, POP3,
>>> FTP sessions and 99% of the Windows people will be free from trouble.
>>>
>>
>> Software firewalls aren't that effective, particularly when they are
>> running on the machine that they're designed to protect. If one must run
>> Windows, all that is really needed is a little bit of thought and the three
>> programs that I mentioned above. Most Windows users are sitting behind a
>> NAT, which takes care of blocking incoming connections, and those that
>> aren't behind a NAT, probably should be.
>
> You misunderstood - I don't consider software solutions running on
> non-dedicated servers to be firewalls. I was speaking of a firewall
> appliance, although I could have better stated that.
>

My bad. Sometimes, the vernacular usage of terms makes things hard to
communicate about. :-) It seems that most people that discuss firewalls
today mean something like ZoneAlarm or the "firewall" in Windows XP SP2,
which is really nothing but a stumbling block in the way of getting to the
core of the system, and even sometimes such systems are helpful to
crackers, as opposed to hindrances.

Personally, I don't run any of the software that I mentioned above. Then
again, I also do not use Windows, and I try to not use passwords when
possible as authentication. For example, I can go anywhere on my own
network that I want to go, so long as I provide a key. But I can't get
into my accounts by password--nor would I really want to. Given the
strength of today's computers, passwords are relatively trivial to crack.

-- Mike