Zone Alarm Pro is definitely the way to go. Took a chance on it based on recommendation, used the 10 day trial, and then upgraded. The grc.com test gave it straight As...
All the time!! That's a riot! And I downloaded some freeware and then found out I was testing websites and sending feedback. But ZA said it was a port that was often used to scan for trojans - and I have people who keep sending me trojans that steal passwords, LOL. I actually got SirCam - but only once, LOL. They keep sending variations of it with different names.
In Pro, you get a lot more control over security levels and logging features. I have several friends who have the free version and are happy with it. The Pro versionalso has the capability of filtering e-mail attachments, but haven't messed with that yet. I'm moving from dial-up to satellite soon, so we'll see how it does with that type of connection.
My Zone Alarm adventures I must be a frustrated techie. I am looking the alerts up to see who everybody is - I got alerts from Thailand and Korea and other interesting places. Soooo, I was connected to Visual Route Server at Dulles - I can input the IP address and it tells me where they are. I was actually doing something else, and the little alert thing pops up, so I plopped the IP address in Visual Route server to see who it is and it says that Visual Route server aborted my request. So I'm thinking "I typed it wrong," and typed it again, same thing happened. It was typed correctly so I hit the enter key a couple of times. It zapped my computer good and hard, and I had to reboot!!! Sooooooo, I looked at the log file, got the IP address and discovered it was a ping request from Verio (Visual Route server). ROFL. I guess they thought I was trying to hack them
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures There are a lot of punks ( 13, 14 year high schoolers) out there running port scanners all over the place. Most of the time their harmless. It's when you see a patern of probes happening very deliberately and in a short time span always hammering on specific ports , thats when you have to be on your toes. A average computer gets scanned by those automated scanners 3 , 4 times a day. It's just a sweep off known points of access to see if there's any leaks to be exploited. If you are on dial-up, you don't have to worry to much. But if you have broadband, just make sure you have a firewall ( hardware or software) between the net and your network.
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures Yeah, I get it. I just thought my little adventure was funny. Zone alarm kind of tells you - I got a couple that it said they were scanning the port usually used for trojans. What is it when it's HTTP port 80? I know that's the one where you can check to get information about a server....
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures My kids tell me I have a "FIRE WALL" (they didn't even charge me for the answer)... What is a zone alarm...how do you get it...do you need it with a "FIRE WALL" ???
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures I don't know George. I don't think so. Zone Alarm is a software "firewall." It says it makes my computer invisible if someone is trying to peek whenI'm online.
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures If your kids say you have a firewall, then you're safe. Kids know more about computers then most people working a support job lol.
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures My oldest was the "CO-TEACHER" for the computer class he attended at school...
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures Zone Alarm isn't really strong enough to keep that from happening Breeze. It'll keep most of the kids out, but not a full blown attack by someone who really knows what they are doing. We tested it and it's not all that hard to get through. We use a router that will not answer a port call on any of the off ports and then it all goes through an active server that has the Neowatch Professional and a couple of other such programs on it and that's all it's used for. Then it all goes through a hub. Each computer also has neowatch pro on it and write access is password protected on all machines except for trusted programs. All email or other programs are automatically scanned for virus contamination both on the active server and on each individual machine. Even with all of that, we are not ever 100% guaranteed against snoopers and hackers. All we can hope to do is keep ahead of the vast majority of hackers. It's a never ending battle no matter how much effort you put into it.
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures Zone alarm is not meant for businesses. But for home users it's good enough.
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures I can well understand what you are saying, Leo, but while a home system would not include all the junk I got because most of it would not be needed, The average person would have no need for a server nor hubs nor more than one computer, but maybe a good router would be great and they aren't all that expensive either. Addtron will sell anybody one (and only one) at a greatly reduced price. Somewhere around $125 or so including overnight shipping UPS if you call them up and get their latest homestyle router. Routers are great security items even if you only have one computer and are on 56k dial up. But my point was that zone alarm simply isn't anywhere near what neowatch is and anybody can get a copy of it for free. No problem at all. And it will beat the pants off of Zone Alarm any old day. You can't get the pro version for free, but the free one is almost as good only the pro version has a few more bells and whistles the free one don't have. So why pay for junk when you can get one of the best for free?
Re: My Zone Alarm adventures Leo I see that Zone Alarm is free too. Just did a bit of research and came up with this excellent article by Magna Carta News Service and so I downloaded it so everyone could see it easily and it won't get away. I think it's pretty informative about computer security and some of what to do about it. You or others might want to read it. http://www.creditwrench.com/freesoftware/security1.html Enjoy.
Greetings: I have Verizon DSL which uses DHCP. If you want to connect more than one computer to it, you have to buy a router and set up your own network. I bought a Linksys router with a built in firewall. Hackers can only 'see' the router on the internet and it won't let them at any of the computers connected to it. Of course, this does not protect from downloading viruses, etc, but it does prevent scans and browsing for open ports.
They sure like to scan. I've been on 3 hours, been scanned 4 times. It's interesting. I guess I'll get tired of it after a while, hehe.
