Re: Do I really NEED a firewall??
From: Tech Zero (spamnet-feb_at_dragonfur.ca)
Date: 02/21/04
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Date: 21 Feb 2004 10:30:57 GMT
The voice of "Phin" drifted in on the cyber-winds,
from the sea of virtual chaos...
> I have a DSL (actually I think it's lower than dsl just under 128kbps
> d/l ADSL?) and I'm not on it all the time, it's not a permanently on
> connection.
A "part time" DSL connection? Odd...
> I read these firewalls (like Norton, Zonealarm, etc.) are largely
> ineffective and largely create paranoia in their end-user and that
> unless I have a 24/7 cable connection I shouldn't bother with a
> firewall that my "router firewall" will be enough to deal with
> unwanted connection attempts.
>
> How can I see if I indeed have a router firewall and is this true?
I would say a definite maybe. I frequently get systems in the shop for
"general repair" (read: error unknown/vague), and part of the service
is a viral/trogen scans. And one thing I've learned from these is that
idiots will get into trouble no matter how much protection they think
they may have.
Case in point, two recent systems, Jack's gaming rig & Average Joe's
data churner... Both arrived on my workbench with the same complaint,
"sluggish with odd errors". Not much to go on, but I've had systems
arrive with the unobvious message "Not Happy", a joke often played by
the senior tech.
Joe's system had all of the latest in paranoia gear; Antivirus &
dedicated trogen scanners, two running firewalls, a proxy server, and
several Spyware scanners. There was so much "protection" running on his
128MB I was a little surprised it was running as good as it was, let
along crawl.
By comparison Jack's system was barren. Aside from a free On-Demand AV
scanner, there was no protection software running at all. His system
did have all the latest service packs & hot fixes installed, so I'd say
it was secure as a windows system can get without additional help.
So, which of the two systems arrived infected?
If you guest Jack's then you guessed wrong, his system was a viral free
zone. His HD was so clean you could eat of those patters. This is not
uncommon though, most gamers' systems I've fixed reflect this trend.
Firewalls are just not worth the trouble on their systems, and I'm
inclined to agree with them (at lest on principal).
As for Joe's little slugger, it had 2 viruses and more then a dozen
Spyware buddies 7 other nasties gumming up the works. Something on his
system had also "mugged" his AV software, preventing it from getting
virus Dat updates...
($$$ A days work to repair, vs an hour to tune... $$$)
-- The Tech Zero, Maxwell C.G. Pollare
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