The Logic Off Topic list

Hi,

As I wrote on the LUG, here are some practical questions (I'm a newbie 
when it comes to firewalls etc, but I want to learn about it in order to 
protect my system and my data)

>Generally speaking, windows environment:
>You have a firewall.
>
Sygate personal firewall. Phil Angus recommended that on the LUG 
recently. It's freeware and it looks like a good piece of software.

>Have you blocked all netbios incoming traffic?
>
How do you do this? Especially the word "all" worries me. :-)

>ports 135-39, port 445 should be closed to the outside world.
>
Any websites where I can learn about these ports etc? I have no idea 
where I should even start to look to block these ports. (and all those 
different protocols: UDP, ICMP,... yikes... :-)

>Windows2000/NT...have you changed the default permissions? i.e. user 
>accounts, IPC shares, admin shares...user names...
>
What if it is a computer with just 1 account (who obviously is the 
administrator)?

>latest service 
>packs?
>
Yes.

>Machine run IIS?
>
What's this?

>No Frontpage, right?
>
You mean Frontpage server stuff and not just the website-creation tool, 
I guess?

>All hotfixes up to date?
>
Ehm.... oops. :-)

>turn off file and print sharing on your front channel NIC(the one 
>connected to the web).
>
I've looked at the properties of my network card and can't set that 
there. How is this done?

I'm often using ICQ as it's handy to transfer big files to friends. I 
guess ICQ isn't safe at all. How can I make it a bit safer and still 
keep it full functional (all security settings are set to people I 
authorised only, but I still don't trust it very much).

And finally, I just got a link from Yoonchi (zonealarm.com) (thanks 
Yoonchi!)  and it looks interesting. He told me he's using their 
ZoneAlarm firewall. Are there any firewalls that are exceptionally 
better than others or firewalls that offer more security? Sorry if these 
are dumb questions, but I'm new to this.

Thanks for any info or links you can give.

Bye,
Joeri

-- 
Belway Productions

Hi Joeri & all,

I followed you to the OT for this firewall discussion.
I recently started looking at installing a firewall (I'm on Mac
though) and have been pointed at Norton Internet utilities - contains
a firewall + anti-virus.

If anyone knows of a freeware or shareware firewall for Mac, please
let me know.

Regards - Colin