Re: how effective is it?

From: Bruce Chambers (bchambers_at_nospamcableone.net)
Date: 10/11/03 

Date: Sat, 11 Oct 2003 10:46:40 -0600

Greetings --

  WinXP's built-in firewall is fine at stopping incoming attacks, and
hiding all of your ports from probes. It doesn't give you any alarms
to tell you that it is working, though. What WinXP also does not do,
is protect you from any Trojans or spyware that you might download and
install inadvertently. It doesn't monitor out-going traffic at all,
much less block (or at least ask you about) the bad or the
questionable out-going packets.

    ZoneAlarm, Kerio, or Sygate are much better, and there are a free
versions available. Personally, I've been very happy with Symantec's
Norton Internet Security 2002 (NIS 2004 is now available), which
includes Norton AntiVirus, Norton Personal Firewall, parental
controls, privacy controls, and ad blocking. (Just the elimination of
many of the pop-up ads on the Internet made the price worth-while to
me.)

Bruce Chambers 

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"Az" <Azy@mr.com> wrote in message
news:09ca01c38e1f$7cecf420$a101280a@phx.gbl...
> Hi, How effective is the firewall I enabled on my windows
> Xp home version? I went into the advance section tab in
> the properties section-THen I clicked on the where it
> says to protect my computor & network ...........That is
> the only firewall I have now- I know nothing about how
> they work and how to install others & their disadvantages-
> Ive heard to do just one firewall and not more than that
> to prevent "conflicts"- I would like to just keep the one
> I enabled from my pc-SO is it enough?? thanks for any help

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