Windows 98
How secure is that treasured computer of yours ?
You have your new computer, you have your ISP and now you are ready to go surfing the network to investigate your hobbies, offer your business to the world, or just entertain yourself with this enormous ever changing network.
It is an exciting time.
But now that expensive computer with its smart crisp software is open and vulnerable to attack. These intrusions will happen at an alarming frequency, without your knowledge and therefore explicitly without your consent.
Intrusions from big business as they use your computer to gather market research data. Intrusions from the low life who take great delight in trying to get your credit card or other personal details from within your computer so they can expand their criminal activities. This is happening at an alarming speed and you will be totally unaware.
You may notice your modem lights flashing when they should not be and think no more of it.
One of the most destructive attackers is the use of scanners. These randomly scan the list of IP addresses until they locate a live computer and then they can home in and do their worst.
I personally watched in amazement as one back door intrusion resulted in 23 commands within 9 seconds.
This attacker then thought it would be fun to try and remove my system files and had he been sucessful I would have had to re-format this software to become operational again. I doubt that the attacker even knew what country I was in, so there is no personal reason for these random attacks.
If you have no extra security programs installed, you will be amazed how open your computer is to these intrusions. There are many good web sites that will test your security and this is just one that I know of.
Here Steve Gibson's site will demonstrate your degree of vulnerability
Try Shields Up and Probe your computer ports
So how can you protect yourself ?
The answer is to install a firewall that protects your computer from incoming intrusions and prevents your computer programs from intruding on others. More on that subject in Computer Security Part 2.
A simple Firewall definition:-
A firewall ABSOLUTELY ISOLATES your computer from the Internet using a "wall of code" that inspects each individual "packet" of data as it arrives at either side of the firewall, inbound to or outbound, from your computer to determine whether it should be allowed to pass or be blocked.
A good firewall "free for private users" is available here
Zone Alarm
I would recommend the download and use of this program. It is easy to use and a re-visit to here
Try Shields Up and Probe your computer ports
will demonstrate that your computer is in STEALTH mode to all would be attackers.
It is in our interest to stop the hacker on one hand and to stop big business behaving like big brother.
Once done you can go back to the fun of surfing the network for your pleasure, safe in the knowledge that you are invisible to the attacker
