[Ham-Computers] FIREWALL

[jeff]

On Fri, 2004-08-20 at 17:48, Don wrote:
> I currently use zone alarm on a winxp home system
> is the firewall in XP any better or worse
> need educated here

I highly recommend Zone Alarm.  I use it on all of my Windows boxes.
For obvious reasons, I do not trust MS.  Their first firewall did almost
nothing.  I haven't read a lot of positive things about their new
version.

One of the problems with the first was that it prevented *some* things
from getting in but was not concerned with what was going OUT.  Zone
Alarm does this really well.   Why does this matter?  If you get a virus
or some spyware wants to `phone home,' ZA will pop up a box asking if
this application should be allowed to access the internet.  You have the
choice here.  


Look at it this way: it's good to have as much protection as possible. 
It's bad to not have enough protection.


Steve Gibson has a very good site with all sorts of security info (he
did Spinrite - don't have the url now - gibsonresearch.com?).  There are
many other places to look too.  I believe PC World did a comparison
recently - it should be on their site (pcworld.com).

It's good of you to do the research - you'll be a better-informed and
better-protected pc user.  More of us need to take an interest.

THIS GOES FOR EVERYONE.  USE A FIREWALL.  USE VIRUS PROTECTION AND KEEP
IT UPDATED WEEKLY AT LEAST.  KEEP UP WITH YOUR OPERATING SYSTEM PATCHES
(with the exception of XP SP2).  If you connect to the internet and do
no use a firewall, you're inviting hackers.



best,
jeff