I've been busy with computers lately rather than having fun posting here - but some of the following might be interesting.
We have quite an outbreak of email worm/virii and I got interested in how these things work. Surprisingly - if you use MS Outlook Express for mail - your computer can become infected even if you don't open attachments.
If you go here: http://grc.com/default.htm
you can test how well the various ports on your computer are defended against people trying to break in. Steve Gibson is well respected in computer circles so you might also want to try his free program "optout". I even found programs installed on my computer which were logging ads and "calling home" with details.
At school we use a dedicated proxy server/firewall. You might want to try a free software equivalent called ZoneAlarm. It lets you know when any programs on your computer are "calling out" without your knowledge as with email worms - or people are contacting your computer. http://www.zonelabs.com/zonealarmnews.htm
Hopefully I haven't made anyone unnecessarily paranoid. Let me know if you want more detail..
Jimbo
We have quite an outbreak of email worm/virii and I got interested in how these things work. Surprisingly - if you use MS Outlook Express for mail - your computer can become infected even if you don't open attachments.
If you go here: http://grc.com/default.htm
you can test how well the various ports on your computer are defended against people trying to break in. Steve Gibson is well respected in computer circles so you might also want to try his free program "optout". I even found programs installed on my computer which were logging ads and "calling home" with details.
At school we use a dedicated proxy server/firewall. You might want to try a free software equivalent called ZoneAlarm. It lets you know when any programs on your computer are "calling out" without your knowledge as with email worms - or people are contacting your computer. http://www.zonelabs.com/zonealarmnews.htm
Hopefully I haven't made anyone unnecessarily paranoid. Let me know if you want more detail..
Jimbo