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firewall trouble

The_Trip

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Hey All,

does anyone know how to configure Zone Alarm Pro so that I can see the pics?
I can open the forum and read the text, but no pics.
 

Preferred User

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I'd be very surprised if ZA is blocking your pics. I use it too and have no problem. Right click on ZA and shut it down. Then go to the site. I'd guess it's no different.
 

The_Trip

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thats what i tried and after i turn it off I can see the pics.
 

Cman

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there is a firewall thread about once a week in this forum. try checking through some of the old threads and see if you can find an answer.

also, zone alarm SUCKS!!! i've had too many problems to list with both the free AND PAY version.

thank god i have SP2 now, so i just use the built in firewall. (i also have a router)
 

OCC-402

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Cman said:
there is a firewall thread about once a week in this forum. try checking through some of the old threads and see if you can find an answer.

also, zone alarm SUCKS!!! i've had too many problems to list with both the free AND PAY version.

thank god i have SP2 now, so i just use the built in firewall. (i also have a router)

you realize that the SP2 firewall sucks so much compared to Zone Alarm's security protection. It's a bitch to configure but its fucking bulletproof when it comes to making sure the ports are secure.
 

Cman

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OCC-402 said:
you realize that the SP2 firewall sucks so much compared to Zone Alarm's security protection. It's a bitch to configure but its fucking bulletproof when it comes to making sure the ports are secure.
no its not. software firewalls in general are pretty useless. ask any hacker. the safest thing to do is to have a hardware firewall like a router.

as i mentioned i also have a router, i just use the SP2 firewall because its there and because it was an excuse to get rid of fucking god awful zone alarm. and yes, i know how to set it. i'm a tech for god sake. it was errors with the program that was the problem
 

mindido

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Here are two of the threads where this issue has been discussed previously:

http://forum.exp0sed.com/showthread.php?t=2814

http://forum.exp0sed.com/showthread.php?t=2668

CMan,

"software firewalls in general are pretty useless. ask any hacker."

I'm sorry to say but I can't disagree with you more. No firewall (as well as any type of security) is infallible but not to have one is really asking for major trouble. Yes, it is best to be behind a router but, today, a software firewall is also necessary as it will be your first indicator that your machine has become infected. Additionally, the SP2 firewall offers no help with this as it only monitors incoming traffic, not outgoing, so if a virus or trojan slips by your security and activates, Win's firewall won't tell you. So, its basically worthless.

I've been using the free version of ZA for several years now, and have put it on many machines, and really like it. Once you get past the initial "getting to know you" stage it works just fine. I rarely hear anything from it nowadays. But I do still watch the outgoing bar like a hawk just in case.

The Trip,

Your question has been dealt with before and I believe the answer is in one of those two threads. If not, let me know because I'm positive we've fixed this previously.
 

Cman

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Trust me man, I know what I'm doing :computer:

I haven't had a virus in years and I never said the SP2 firewall was good, I said it was better than nothing.

What I have installed:

- Norton AV
- Pest Patrol
- Spybot
- Registry Mechanic

Which I update and do scans with constantly.

I also look after half a dozen other computers for family members and they never get viruses either ;)
 

mindido

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CMan,

I think you miss the point. While I believe the two of us have been working with these infernal machines for quite a while (I started about 1982 or 83), my experience indicates that the vast majority of computer users out there understand very little about these machines, and even less about computer security.

We realize why you don't open attachments or blindly click on OK when some website offers to install some applet, but most people don't. I see the results of this negligence all the time. I also have not had a virus or trojan in several years but that is because of practices I've learned in dealing with this crap, but I still occasionally find files which have been surreptitiously loaded onto my machine by some website. These are virtually always java applets (thank heavens I virtually never use IE).

So, for the vast majority of users out there, I believe that both a hardware and software firewall is necessary. If something slips by the hardware firewall, the software firewall will be the first indicator that you've caught something.

And FYI, I was reading something a few weeks ago (I'll try and find it) that suggested about 30% of this crap is now incorporating a keylogger into the applet. If you catch one of those, I really hope you have no valuable data associated with the computer.
 

Preferred User

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mindido said:
And FYI, I was reading something a few weeks ago (I'll try and find it) that suggested about 30% of this crap is now incorporating a keylogger into the applet.

Mindido, I'd like to know if you find that stat.

I agree with Cman, to a good hacker a software firewall is a challenge, but it's not Mt. Everest. Nothing beats a hardware firewall, but for the average user who can't spend $100's or configure it, if you're behind a NAT router and have a software firewall, most internet crap will be stopped.

Maybe it's all just in what you get used to, but I like Zone Alarm. It starts with the assumption that nothing gets in, but it logs well so I can poke a hole through it. I can always sneak a VPN through it.

The one I really don't like is Norton I Security. If it logs somewhere I don't know where. Don't shoot me if I'm wrong though, I get frustrated every time I deal with it (which is way too often thanks to their agreement with Dell) so haven't taken the time.
 

Cman

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Yeah, all the Symantec / Norton products are crap, expect for NAV and Ghost. I hear nothing but problems stemming for the Norton Firewall.
 

mindido

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I don't know what happened to Norton, I used to use AV and Utilities religiously, but quit around 2001. It seemed the AV updates rarely worked correctly and after the annual update period expired, a DL of the newest version also didn't work and they consistently screwed up the payment. I found AVG and Zone Alarm shortly after and haven't looked back.

About a month ago a friend from Pennsylvania stopped by with a problem with Norton Suite. I tried every trick I know of to get rid of the firewall but couldn't. It was really an eye opener. I did finally disable it (I think) and got AVG and Zone Alarm working on it, but still, that was a real nightmare. After that experience I couldn't recommend Norton to anyone. It's too bad. They used to be a really good company.

Preferred user,

I'll find it.
 

mindido

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Preferred User,

I'm not sure if this is the article I was reading but it says the same thing:

http://www.macnewsworld.com/story/35748.html

Feel comfortable using your business computer for personal use, think again. This suggests that almost 80% of companies are now doing some type of employee monitoring. 25% have actually fired someone for that personal use.

http://www.keylogger.org/articles.c...gement_Association_Annual_Survey_Reports&id=2

A really interesting story, and why some of these porn sites need either regulation or their balls cut off.

http://www.securityfocus.com/columnists/250

Do you like Real player? Heres a somewhat dated story of the info they keep on you. The story is somewhat technical but worth the effort. You'll get a good idea of what a packet sniffer can do.

http://grc.com/downloaders.htm

A few good explanations of key loggers:

http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1829

http://www.informit.com/guides/printerfriendly.asp?g=security&seqNum=23&rl=1

Want to know about keeping your own info private, heres a good article:

http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1829
 

Preferred User

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Thanks for the articles mindido. I was particularly interested in keyloggers as I have a couple clients who are a bit paranoid about them...paranoid as far as I'm concerned. I've put them in the category of "chicken little" type over hyped security concerns...but would like to know some stats that show that I'm wrong.

I wish I could say that I'm surprised by the Real Player article. Not at all. Hate RP, but let's face it, ya gotta have it. But when you install it, if you let them have their way they will take over your file types, install a piece of crap that's always looking to update "the valuable Real Player", put their dumb logo all over your computer, and automatically activate some Real Messenger that no one uses. Only program that's messier is AOL as far as I'm concerned.
 

mindido

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Hey Preferred User,

I don't keep Real Player installed on my machine anymore because of all the crap it does. I have a copy in case I run into something that I really, really want but then uninstall it and start looking for the same file in a different format.

I think your concerns about keyloggers used to be correct but, if you've followed computer security over time, you know that things change rapidly. Keylogging is a natural evolution (probably not the correct term) of spyware and virus'. In fact, its probably the pinnacle for spyware.

Since identity theft is such a growing business, and keyloggers are a particularly good tool, my guess is that we're probably going to see more of these in the near future.
 

Preferred User

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I'm listening on the keyloggers. You might be right...would like to see some data. On the other hand, I don't think they know a way around a hardware firewall with true SPI...or am I on weak ground there too?
 

mindido

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Preferred User,

I try and keep up on the security situation so the next time I find something of interest I'll post it here. I haven't always done that in the past.

As far as the hardware firewall is concerned, any security device CAN be defeated if someone is willing to spend the time and effort to get around it. Thats just a basic tenet of any type of security. Now, as far as most of us are concerned, we don't have a lot that a thief is interested in other than the following:

1. Bandwidth. For those of us with broadband, this is spyware/adware/virus/trojan heaven. If a machine connected to broadband can be infected, that machine can then be directed to try and infect any and all other machines that it pings and finds open ports. The same is true of dial-up except that dial-up can't do the same quantity of damage.

2. Personal info. For obvious reasons.

A true SPI? Remember what I said above. Also remember that a lot of what we're seeing today is coming in with regular port 80 traffic so the hardware router probably can't do anything about it as it just sees normal packets. Alot of this stuff is surruptitious or using social engineering to trick the user into allowing the crap onto the machine. I started a post a couple of days ago that demonstrates the surruptitious variety. If you feel up to it, and have followed the instructions and warnings, I would recommend that you try it as its a good demonstration of how easy it is nowadays to infect your machine.

You also mentioned in post 14 about "paranoia". Although anyone can certainly go overboard with any type of security, that doesn't mean that you can totally forget about security. When I work on someones machine, if that machine is going to be connected to the internet, I make sure the client understands the dangers and will set the machine up with appropriate software (software firewall, AV, Spybot, Ad Aware, SpywareBlaster, Firefox, etc.) and explain what they do and why they are necessary. So far, I've only run into a few minor problems with these machines and it is invariably because the client opened an attachment or now, more frequently, got hit by a drive-by (the post I started a couple of days ago is a drive-by).

But how long will this last? I don't know. But I do know that these scumbags aren't stupid and when they're scumware isn't working as effectively as they would like, they change it. And the inclusion of keyloggers in their scumware is one of the recent changes that people have noticed.

I'll get you the URL's of some of the sites that keep track of this stuff. Let me know if you have any further questions.
 

Preferred User

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Yea I did see your other post about the web site. I just rebuilt this laptop a week ago. Finally got it close to being back to where it should be and haven't ghosted the drive so didn't want to put myself at risk.

As for parnoia, in some ways a virus hoax is as good as a virus. It gets everyone scurrying around and there are plenty of those out there. I spend more time calming down my clients (e.g. "I keep getting these errors that say I have a virus") then I spend removing actual stuff so I try not to contribute to the mis-information. Like you though, I'm aware the tactics are always changing so I don't want to keep my head in the sand.
 

mindido

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Heh, heh!

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Thats why I try and explain to clients of ONLY using certain apps (Spybot, Ad Aware, Firefox, etc). I'll get calls asking, "Should I get Ad Aware or Ad Ware (or whatever spelling)". Bait and switch, confusion; additional tools of the scumware makers. A certain amount of paranoia today is probably a good thing because this stuff is getting so blasted prevalent. Especially if you visit a lot of porn or celeb sites.

I actually don't spend much time on the AV mfg's websites as you'll get a lot of the hoax stuff there. Places I like are Spyware Warrior and CastleCops which are forums of interested people. I'll get you a more comprehensive list.
 

mindido

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Preferred User,

I'm still trying to find the specific article I mentioned but I keep getting sidetracked. Anyway, here are a few of the sites that I frequent:

Spyware/adware forums (worth the while registering if you have a real interest in the subject):

http://castlecops.com/
http://spywarewarrior.com/
http://www.short-media.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=57

Zone Alarm forum (for specific questions about Zone Alarm problems)

http://forum.zonelabs.org/zonelabs

A very good site on firewalls and general security

http://www.firewallguide.com/

A good site to check your computers internet vulnerability

https://www.grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2

Will keep on looking.
 
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