Hi malexander Thursday, September 11, 2003, 10:58:32 PM, you wrote:
m> Hi m> Just a point I wanted to make as I've seen one or two comments where m> people have said with The Bat, and with dial-up, they don't need a m> firewall. I made a comment to that effect..that if these firewall problems went on any longer I might have to shift to dialup to rid myself of the bother. Is that what you're referring to? m> Sorry, but you're leaving yourself open if you don't use at least a m> software firewall, even with a dial-up. Open to the possibility - yes. Vulnerable - no, if your pattern of behavior is like the following: - You don't stay online very long: This is the primary reason DSL/Cable users are at risk. If you're online for a long time you become a much more attractive target. Even if scripts are used, your chances of being cracked are much less if you're on dialup, simply because you may terminate your connection at any time and have no fixed IP to attack. If you stay online for 8 hours at a time, then sure you're at risk. How many dialup users do that though? - You stay up to date with all security patches for your OS. - You run a frequently updated antivirus. - You take sensible precautions such as not opening suspicious attachments. A>>Blaster/LovSan tells you. Blaster and its variants spread initially via an email attachment. If you didn't click on it you were safe. Infected hosts attempted to spread to other hosts via a DCOM RPC vulnerability that MS had released a patch for a long time ago. If you were up to date with the patches, there is no way a dialup user would have been infected. Cheers, -Vishal ________________________________________________ Current version is 2.00 | "Using TBUDL" information: http://www.silverstones.com/thebat/TBUDLInfo.html
