RE: Should webservers, eg. IIS 6 have anti--virus installed on them?

From: Floyd Russell (floyd_at_floydsoft.com)
Date: 07/18/05

  • Next message: Jeff: "RE: Should webservers, eg. IIS 6 have anti--virus installed on them?" 
    To: <focus-ms@securityfocus.com>
Date: Mon, 18 Jul 2005 14:13:23 -0500

    I've held a contentious view on this in the past. Traditionally speaking,
    viruses are only spread through user action, (Attachment, execution of
    untrusted file, etc). A webserver should never be used for random internet
    browsing, checking email, running untrusted software, etc. Also, you have to
    consider the performance impact. If this server is running an intensive site
    can you afford the CPU overhead of an active anti-virus scanner? Is it going
    to lock files that need to be written to by the site?

    If the machine is just a webserver then patch, firewall, use as
    well-designed as possible code, and limit access & lock down as much as
    possible. It seems to be that these five things would be enough to prevent
    the viruses from taking control of your machine.

    Remember, this is just viruses. Exploits are a completely different matter.

    fr

    -----Original Message-----
    From: Shyaam [mailto:shyaam@gmail.com]
    Sent: Monday, July 18, 2005 10:20 AM
    To: ssgill@gilltechnologies.com
    Cc: focus-ms@securityfocus.com
    Subject: Re: Should webservers, eg. IIS 6 have anti--virus installed on
    them?

    According to my level of knowledge(which is very minimal, in this
    especially), I would say that a web server should be patched well
    first. the anti-virus is a secondary issue. Ofcourse, you need an
    antivirus too, but there should always be good patches implemented
    which checks for the latest signatures.
    --Shyaam

    On 7/17/05, Sarbjit Singh Gill <ssgill@gilltechnologies.com> wrote:
    >
    > Greetings
    >
    > Should IIS have anti-virus installed on them. I know I would do it for a
    > fileserver but for IIS, I rather lock it down.
    >
    > Thanks.
    > /Gill
    >
    >
    > --------------------------------------------------------------------------
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    > --------------------------------------------------------------------------
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    >
    > 

    --
Thank you in advance for your time and consideration.
Yours Sincerely,
R.S.Shyaam Sundhar
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  • Next message: Jeff: "RE: Should webservers, eg. IIS 6 have anti--virus installed on them?"