|
Some Links
Archives Return to the Original Gunman Return to Dylon Whyte's Current Thoughts Blog Buddies Draxenn's Mindless Madness The Displaced Bostonian Inside the Mind of Jake Ortman One Click from Sanity Kusari Online Question Reality Paradoxian Tarot How Many Would it Take? Hot or Not? Face the Jury 
Email Me
IM Anyone? ICQ: 2128006 MSN: kusari_kahn @hotmaildotcom AIM: KusariKahn Y!: kusari55 |
Disclaimer: Please note that the writer is not responsible for dead, boring, mind expanding or dangerous website links and/or software, follow links and install programs at your own risk! Friday, October 15, 2004
"Shields Up!"It is an unfortunate fact that a base installation of any Windows version is riddled with security holes and while the fine folks at Microsoft work day and night to patch various problems, it is seldom enough to keep your computer protected from the dangers that lurk online. The following are some additions that can be installed on your computer in order to offer some extra defence. Javacool Software's ( http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/ ) "Spyware Blaster" may have a slightly goofy named, but it has proven to be one of my newest favourite system additions. Once installed, Spyware Blaster patches over 3,000 known security holes in both Internet Explorer and Mozilla/Firefox web browsers. Javacool is also continually updating their database of known exploits, the free version of Spyware Blaster requires manual updating, but for a small donation the program will automatically update itself on a regular basis. A common, but often misunderstood, security term heard on the Internet today is "Firewall". This is due to the fact that Firewalls can take many forms, including hardware and software, both of which serve the same function of existing between your computer and the Internet in order to protect your system against intrusion. Hardware firewalls afford the best protection, but can also be expensive and difficult to configure. Software firewalls are much more common, in fact, Microsoft has included a firewall with Windows XP since Service Pack 1, which has gone through a major upgrade with Service Pack 2. However, as with many Microsoft products, the XP Firewall suffers from an overabundance of user friendless of the sort that can render Internet connections non-functional with no apparent cause. It's also apparent that most of the energy directed against breaching computer security will always be focused at the company that occupies the largest consumer base, which is, of course, Microsoft. This is why it is sometimes considered preferable to use software from smaller computer security firms, which makes Sygate's "Personal Firewall Pro" ( http://www.sygate.com ) a perfect firewall choice. PFP does require a bit of configuring when first installed, as it has to learn which programs are allowed Internet access. This configuration is very straightforward, as PFP will ask you if individual programs are allowed access as they try to connect to the Internet. If you just launched or are familiar with the program that is trying to connect, you answer yes, if an unfamiliar program attempts to connect, then you can block its access, until it can be confirmed as valid or as a malady. posted by Kusari 11:25 AM |
