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Integrety of the Net

 
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Greenhornet84



Joined: 11 Nov 2003
Posts: 406
Location: Uper Darby PA

PostPosted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 5:36 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

Yo!
Some of you have followed my tale of being off line for 16 days because the ineptitude of Verizon and for 13 weeks before that because of worms. Not a virus, worms piggyback into your computer, it seems, everytime You go on the Net. Does anybody know the Best firewall to protect against this? Norton dosn't protect against these bugs. I went online last night and ran Ad Aware tonight and found 36 bugs. Help.
Mark
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JRS



Joined: 09 Jun 2002
Posts: 2386
Location: USA

PostPosted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 5:50 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

Well, a firewall will not do you any good if the virus/worm orginated in an unfiltered spam email.

That's why I don't use Outlook anymore. I prefer to have my email 'on the web' and my ISP automatically tells me that a message contained a worm/virus. The process I have situated is for them to remove the email and only show me who sent it. So far none have come from family or friends.

One thing you may want to try is booting your computer to a DOS command prompt and then do a search for *.PF files. If existent, delete them immediately. 99.9% of those files are worm/virus infected.

JRS
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Greenhornet84



Joined: 11 Nov 2003
Posts: 406
Location: Uper Darby PA

PostPosted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 6:02 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

JRS
Thanks for the repley, but Huh?
Could you walk me through this? After what I've been through, I'm starting to understand paranoia.
Tks
Mark
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JRS



Joined: 09 Jun 2002
Posts: 2386
Location: USA

PostPosted: Sat Apr 17, 2004 8:08 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

Ok, in similar 'english' terms:

Say you have a $1 million dollar house and you buy the most sophisticated alarm system that man can make. It has redundant power, motion sensors, break-glass sensors,... the 'works'. Think of that as a hardware and software firewall.

As long as you have the handy-dandy garage door opener and the keys to the house - - you are the 'king'. Life is good and protected.

Then your 17 year old daughter invites her new boyfriend over. Well, think of him as the worm/virus. You know nothing of him but only the fact that your daughter loves him. You want her to be happy and you let him 'in your house'.

Emails... that's the boyfriend. Your wife, son, daughter, or even YOU will read an email that looks friendly. Once read, an *.PF file is installed onto your computer. THAT is the worm.

On your Windows 95/98/NT/XP computer, Click on START, then click on FIND|FILES or Folders. Then do a lookup for "*.PF" on the local hard drives.

If you find one (1)... that's one too many.

One thing that will help you protect your 'home': Visit the Microsoft website and click on the WINDOWS UPDATE link. Do a monthly download of any new critical patched put out by Microsoft. For the month of April, they have identified three (3). A fourth one (04-013) is for Windows 2003.

Got it ?

JRS
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ExemptX2000



Joined: 22 Sep 2002
Posts: 458
Location: Alexandria, LA

PostPosted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 1:34 am    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

Alot of worms, notably the recent Blaster worm, scans IP address for a specific vulnerability and crawls its way into your machine via an exploit (in the case of the Blaster worm, Window's DCOM RPC vulnerability, which opened up a hole in your machine)... Well with these kinds of cases a firewall can definately protect you... As JRS said, this wont protect against emails containing virii because the firewall wont see any odd activities going on because sending/recieving mail is a normal connection...

I personally as a tech recommend that every end user on the net have atleast one good Antivirus software (I prefer Norton Anti-virus, but a great free one is AVG http://www.grisoft.com/us/us_dwnl_free.php ), sofware firewall (I prefer Zone Alarm http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/home.jsp ,) used to be free for home use, not sure if it still is), and Spy/adware detector and remover (Spybot Search & Destroy http://download.com.com/3000-8022-10194058.html?tag=lst-0-3 , its 100% free!)...

Another thing for broadband customers, that adds great protection, from hack attempts anyways, is a router, you can pick them up at most dept stores, they act as hardware firewalls (alot more secure than software firewalls) and also allow u too share your internet connection with multiple PCs in your home... May not be worth it just to get it for its firewall capabilities, but if your really paranoid, and have data you dont want anyone outside your computer accessing, its good added protection...

[ 04-20-2004: Message edited by: ExemptX2000 ]
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JRS



Joined: 09 Jun 2002
Posts: 2386
Location: USA

PostPosted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 4:23 am    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

quote:
Originally posted by ExemptX2000:
.. sofware firewall (I prefer Zone Alarm http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/home.jsp ,) used to be free for home use, not sure if it still is), ...Another thing for broadband customers, that adds great protection, from hack attempts anyways, is a router, you can pick them up at most dept stores, they act as hardware firewalls (alot more secure than software firewalls) and also allow u too share your internet connection with multiple PCs in your home... May not be worth it just to get it for its firewall capabilities, but if your really paranoid, and have data you dont want anyone outside your computer accessing, its good added protection...

[ 04-20-2004: Message edited by: ExemptX2000 ]

The Linksys-brand home routers have considerably gone down in price. I bought my 802.11B compliant router (w/4-port switch) back in 2002 for a whopping $200. Today that same router is selling for $40-$50 at Best Buy.

And the recent firmware updates to the Linksys router offers an integration with the Zone Alarm software firewall. So, you essentially have a hardware and software firewall established. Great protection from the ever increasing amount of worms and viruses hovering the internet.

But that still isn't a protection for the tainted emails that you 'accidentally' double-click and allow entry into your computer.

JRS
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McK



Joined: 27 Mar 2003
Posts: 1126
Location: Chicago

PostPosted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 9:46 am    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

quote:
Originally posted by JRS:
One thing you may want to try is booting your computer to a DOS command prompt and then do a search for *.PF files. If existent, delete them immediately. 99.9% of those files are worm/virus infected.

JRS



I did this and was surprised at how many files popped up (I'm operating Windows XP). It seems, from what info I could find, that Windows uses "prefetch" to create these *.pf files whenever an application is opened, to speed loading time. Can files created within my own system become infected? Is there a way to either disable this function, or to determine which files are legit (created within my own drive) versus those which have somehow been infected/created elsewhere? Does that make sense?
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ExemptX2000



Joined: 22 Sep 2002
Posts: 458
Location: Alexandria, LA

PostPosted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 3:05 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

Thats something else about a router I forgot to mention if u get the 802.11B comnpilant ones JRS was talking about, which is wireless LAN, these are great for laptops, but PLEASE have a qualified technician install them, or at the very least, follow the directions step by step, and setup the Admin password and DO NOT use a simple password... Atleast 8 charecters consisting of both numbers and letters... I have found its all too easy for some ppl to stumble upon them with a laptop and a wireless LAN card and use your internet connection for some 'dirty actitivies'...

[ 04-20-2004: Message edited by: ExemptX2000 ]
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JRS



Joined: 09 Jun 2002
Posts: 2386
Location: USA

PostPosted: Tue Apr 20, 2004 8:40 pm    Post subject: Integrety of the Net Reply with quote

ExemptX2000,

One more item we forgot to mention on wireless LANs:

When setting up the wireless laptop, it's ok to use 64-bit encryption (but 128-bit is nice). But once your laptop is configured and able to utilize the wireless router for internet access - - immediately access the router and turn OFF the SSID Broadcast feature.

McK - I recently helped out a customer with issues of a virus that would automatically utilize the send features of her Outlook 2000 client software to send spam emails containing virus attachments. The only way I was able to stop that virus was to boot the computer (using F8 at the boot process) and load the computer in DOS Command prompt mode. It was slow but I managed to find and delete all of the *.PF files. Since deleting those files, her computer runs fine and no more malicious sending of email without her consent.

JRS
JRS
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