ok, STUPID! seriously though, if all you use your' mac for is game playing and web surfing, you don't have much to lose. if you buy things online you have more to lose. if you use it to run your' business you have a lot to lose, including potentially privileged data and customer information. it's foolish to wait until you have a car accident to get insurance or start wearing your' seat belt. by the same token it's silly to not drive as well. it's only prudent to take some steps, such as running antivirus programs (though they usually only catch viruses after most of the damage is done!), using some restraint in what you put on the machine you surf with, baking up your files (which any one with important files should do any way, or they are a fool!), and get a good HARDWARE firewall. a software firewall is nice, but it's running under the same os and on the same machine as your other applications, flaws in the os can not be covered by a firewall running under it, and it's not too hard to tamper with (indeed most of the software firewalls for windows are worthless for this reason).
a hardware firewall will have a limited os if any, and less code means fewer potential holes, and it will be a different os than what's running on your' computer so compromising one doesn't compromise the other immediately. of course some of the hardware firewalls have been hacked, like any security software it's essential to keep them up to date and to read the manual, and change the default password! (surprisingly many people spend good money on a hardware firewall and then fail to change the default password, or even open the manual apparently). all of your' hardware should be power cycled at least once a day, this stops viruses that are only in ram and reloads the os and other software, and on a hardware firewall this will be in memory that's hard to reprogram without the password. and for god's sake, if you care at all about security, don't use wireless! wireless networking is the big security hole in many corporate systems, and the industry has a very bad track record in regard to truthfulness. first the wireless industry came up with "WEP"- "Wired Equivalent Privacy", which was quickly cracked with effort, and eventually shown to be crackable in just minutes with passive, undetectable monitoring. the standards have been improved, but more holes will be found and the range for someone with good equipment putting a little effort into it is much greater than the intended range. it's not that hard to monitor a lot of it from a mile away or more with a little bit of equipment that isn't that hard to buy or build, including a good high gain directional antenna which is easy to build with common materials (as nearly any antenna is). i'm truly alarmed that so many current laptops have wireless built in and many companies are using it for sensitive data, this is not a wise policy, but the marketing engine of the wireless industry, as usual, has been doing a good job of convincing people it is, just like they did the first time around! sure, you haven't been hacked YET, that you know about. and "that you know about" is part of it, according to security experts so many credit cards have been stolen that it's unlikely for your's to be used even if it has been stolen! there is literally a glut on the "market" of stolen credit card information. counting on this glut to protect you is not terribly wise and shows what a large problem it is. and your' machine doesn't have to be the one that's compromised, it can be the other end or even the routers in between you and the other machine and those routers are facing more and more sophisticated attacks as well. and at the least, you can easily be tracked even under the best of conditions if you don't take steps to prevent it and to many this is bad enough. it doesn't take much to do serious damage. most of the viruses, fortunately are fairly lame, largely because they are being written by amateurs. there have been some written by professionals that have done impressive damage before being detected by people who do take the effort. it is foolish and irresponsible not to take reasonable actions. however, a hardware firewall (and reading and learning the manual, and paying attention to it's logs) are a much better investment than anti-virus software which only stops what has already done damage and been "trapped" by security people, before it's observed and found it can't be found in most cases and certainly can't be found by antivirus software. i've been "hacked" on a mac at least once for sure. it was under an older os, but the flaw was in the browser under any os! i've seen things since that are enough to suggest caution. Tim Collier wrote: > > While this article was WAY too long and boring to read, I did search it > for mentions of 'OS X' and this year '2004' or '04' and found no > matches. This article is VERY dated. > Have fun with promoting paranoia and I'll just sit back and enjoy using > my Mac. Until the day comes when I turn it on and find that it is > 'really' infected with a virus or whatever, I'm not going to worry > about it. Call me stupid, but that's how I feel. > I'm tired of the entire topic as I feel it is just playing on the fears > of a fanatical few......and plan to just ignore future posts on this > thread. ------ -- Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this: Lt Gen William Boykin, speaking of G. W. Bush, New York Times, 17 October 2003 = God gave the savior to the German people. We have faith, deep and unshakeable faith, that he was sent to us by God to save Germany. Hermann Goering, speaking of Hitler -- G-List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- We have Apple Refurbished Monitors in stock! | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-List list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-list%40mail.maclaunch.com/> Using a Mac? Free email & more at Applelinks! http://www.applelinks.com
