Everywhere I go these days people are warning about viruses and other malicious files. Is there anything right now that could help me against them? I have McAfee but I want to take the necessary precautions, considering I was hit by the MSBlast and that wasn't fun. Any help would be appreciated.

Firewall. I have a router and none of the computers behind it have gotten infected so far, to my knowledge. What the blasterworm does is connect on some certain ports. but if you have those blocked, it can't happen. So you could get a router or some such hardware device or download and run a program like ZoneAlarm.

Thanks a lot.

 

* Goes to turn his firewall on. *

As for me personally, I won't even attach a computer to my network until it's running an up-to-date firewall & anti-virus package, with the newer worms that are coming out now a new system can be compromised in a matter of minutes. When CodeRed came out I was seeing up to 1,300 connection attempts per minute at the firewall, if a computer isn't protected the first one would have infected it.

 

Always, *always* run a firewall.

I run a hardware NAT and a software firewall (sygate). Update my virus definitions bout once a week. Keep up to date on patches. Thats about all you can do, and make sure you dont open odd looking attachments ;)

Yep, not much more you can do, keep all your software current and don't turn your firewall/anti-virus off.. Just don't get me started on attachments, end user gulibility has to be the leading cause of virus (and related junk) infection..

I personaly don't run a firewall. I'm behind a router and most of the open ports are directed to my Windows 2000 Server which I try to keep as updated as possible with patches and virus software updates. All of my computers (mine being 3 and a laptop) I keep updated on patches and virus software. I haven't had any viruses in years, now adware and spyware is another story that I won't even go into.

 

So far I haven't had any major problems so that seems to work for me.

If you install XP or 2003 now you have to disconnect from your network, install and then boot into the OS and turn on the firewall. After you do that hook backup to the network and head to Windows Update. Install all the patches and then if you want you can disable the firewall. If you install connected to the net you will get hit by msblast within a few minutes. I was hit with it while I was installing 2003 Enterprise. Got DCOM error as soon as the network was configured. My mistake. I have 3 network cards in the server and I forgot to diconnect one.

Service pack 2 enables the firewall by default as will all future releases of any new MS OS.

As far as anti-virus I use NAV Corp on the servers and NAV 2003 on workstations.

On a side not, I found it sort of funny that while installing Windows 2003 (I got a few of those 120 Day Preview Kits) that it brought up as a warning that the computer only had one network card.

 

What does having more then 1 network card allow you to do ?

It allows you to use more than one IP and also alows you to have 2 net connections and one for lan between computers.

In my case one is assigned the site IP and IIS uses that one connected to the router. One is a direct connection to the db server. The third has a second IP assigned to it and connects to a hub so the box can act as domain controller.

It allows you to use more than one IP and also alows you to have 2 net connections and one for lan between computers.

In my case one is assigned the site IP and IIS uses that one connected to the router. One is a direct connection to the db server. The third has a second IP assigned to it and connects to a hub so the box can act as domain controller.

Oh ok, I figured something like that.

 

Thanks for the reply

A little more advanced is Kerio Personal Firewall. It is very nice, and I knew nothing about it before I tried it. With a little reading at some Kerio FAQs sites, I had it worked out. Now if I can only allow ICMP through for Outlook Express only... :(