"You have to be a kind of Jeffersonian citizen on the Web. Be aware, be educated, take personal action. If you're just a passive consumer, they will drive right over you." - Tom Maddox, PrivacyPlace

Malware Tools
Ad-Aware (http://www.lavasoft.com/index.php)
SpywareBlaster (http://javacoolsoftware.com/products.html)
Spybot Search & Destroy (http://security.kolla.de/)

Anti-Virus
AVG Products (http://www.grisoft.com/doc/5/lng/us/tpl/tpl01)
AVG Free edition (http://free.grisoft.com/).

Firewall
AVG with firewall (http://www.grisoft.com/doc/197/lng/us/tpl/tpl01)

Mozilla Products (http://www.mozilla.org/products/)
Firefox: Rediscover the Web (http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/)
Firefox is Mozilla's award-winning next generation Web browser.
Thunderbird: Reclaim Your Inbox (http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/)
Thunderbird is Mozilla's next generation e-mail client. Thunderbird makes emailing safer, faster and easier than ever before.

SeaMonkey (http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/)
SeaMonkey is the all-in-one internet application suite formerly known as the "Mozilla Application Suite", containing a web browser, a mail and newsgroups client, an HTML editor, web development tools, and an IRC chat client in a single software package.
Camino (http://www.mozilla.org/products/camino/)
Camino® is a Web browser optimized for Mac OS X with a Cocoa user interface, and powerful Gecko layout engine. It's the simple, secure, and fast browser for Mac OS X.

Calendar Project (http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/)
We are hard at work creating a first class, cross-platform calendar application. Check out the Sunbird (http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/sunbird.html) project for a promising endeavor in this area.

Safe Surfing
SiteAdvisor (http://www.siteadvisor.com/preview/) helps protect you from all kinds of Web-based security threats including spyware, adware, spam, viruses, browser-based attacks, phishing, online fraud and identity theft.
Welcome to Spyware Warrior! (http://spywarewarrior.com/) Here you'll find a wealth of resources to help you fight spyware and adware.

General Tools
Startup Cop (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,2097,00.asp) is a good utility to keep an eye on what starts, when.
Startup Monitor (http://www.mlin.net/StartupMonitor.shtml) will alert you when programs try to install things that want to auto-start.

Information
Counter-exploitation with frames (http://www.cexx.org/index.htm?FramesOn) no frames (http://www.cexx.org/main.htm?FramesOff)
Adware/Spyware (http://www.cexx.org/adware.htm)

Computer Security (http://www.jmu.edu/computing/security) at James Madison University
TweakHound (http://tweakhound.com) provides good info on various aspects of working with XP, from installation to tweaking.

Installing XP
"The Right Way" To Install Windows XP (http://www.tweakhound.com/xp/installxp/installXP1.htm) is to do as much as possible BEFORE connecting to the internet.
Paul Thurrott's Slipstreaming Windows XP with Service Pack 2 (http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sp2_slipstream.asp)

Sysinternals (http://www.sysinternals.com/index.html)
"The Sysinternals web site provides you with advanced utilities, technical information, and source code related to Windows internals that you won't find anywhere else. Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell alone write and update everything here. We welcome all suggestions and comments. "
Freeware Utilities (http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities.html)
Rootkit Revealer (http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/RootkitRevealer.html)
Limiting Windows Services (http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/2005/07/running-windows-with-no-services.html)

XP Speed Up
"Guide to Useless Services (Windows XP SP2) (http://www.techtree.com/techtree/jsp/article.jsp?article_id=70112&cat_id=584)
Aalaap Ghag
Dec 30 2005

An operating system is made up of various components that work with each other. The OS isn't just one object - it's a collection of smaller objects, each of which performs a different task. Their conjunction is what makes an "operating system". Windows calls these components "services", Linux calls it "daemons" and so on. Each service in Windows is essentially, to put it in a simpler way, an application that stays running in the back doing its job when required. Now each service takes up some memory, which isn't good if your system has a low amount of memory (like 256MB or less). Fortunately, not all of the default services are required by all users, so you can turn some of them off to free up some memory.

In this guide, we'll take a look at the default set of services that come with a fresh installation of Windows XP with Service Pack 2. We'll tell you the ones that you don't need and try to tell you why, so you can disable them without any problems. Each service has three options: automatic, manual and disabled. Automatic is essentially "run at startup"; Manual is a service that is started only when required; Disabled is when a service doesn't start at all. Based on the type of a user you are, there are different settings to recommend, but we'll take the safe route and tell you to disable the services that won't cause important features of your Windows to stop working. If you're comfortable with trying out stunts, you can go ahead and disable some of the other services that aren't mentioned here. If something stops working, you can just turn the service back on - there's no permanent effect. Also, since this is a guide to unneeded services that can be disabled, we won't list the services that are already disabled after Service Pack 2 (like Alerter and Messenger) in an effort to keep the list as simple as possible.

One more thing you have to note is that this list is primarily aimed at home users, so we'll be taking out most of the intranet/network related services that don't affect Internet connectivity. If you're using an office workstation with a proper server and all that jazz, you shouldn't be reading this guide.

To enable or disable services, go to Start -> Run -> and type "services.msc" and hit Enter.

i have just returned home from de sto wit a hardware firewall and router.
i have to figure out how to install the thing.

pray fo me............:thinking:

i have just returned home from de sto wit a hardware firewall and router.
i have to figure out how to install the thing.

pray fo me............:thinking:that's the way to go! it'll help a lot!

which router did you get? i'd be willing to go find the data on it and be avail to help ya understand what the heck this thing is talking about. brand name, model number; if they are not obvious on the front of the thing, look for the manufacturers tag on the bottom.

maybe we might want to do that before you start? just to be sure that you understand what you are doing as you are doing it?

that's the way to go! it'll help a lot!

which router did you get?
netgear FR114P

before, i had to connect to verizon DSL and then launch my browser.
now i seem to be connected as soon as i come up, i just launch whatever i want.

i wonder if this will help at all.

i got hit with a virus by clicking on a link to a porno site that was in somebodies post.
as soon as i clicked they downloaded junk onto my desktop.
my anti virus picked up the virus right away.

i don't think the router can protect me from that.
it seems more toward stopping someone doing port scans and trying to break in.

netgear FR114Pheh; i was gonna go out on a limb and guess the linsys befr114 ... guess maybe there's some similarity ...

before, i had to connect to verizon DSL and then launch my browser.
now i seem to be connected as soon as i come up, i just launch whatever i want.

i wonder if this will help at all.well, the hype is "always connected" and it was a long time before i felt comfortable with that. it used to kinda "comfort" me to be able to turn my connection off like that. once i fought through and made sense out of this firewalling and security stuff, i stopped worrying about it!!

i got hit with a virus by clicking on a link to a porno site that was in somebodies post.
as soon as i clicked they downloaded junk onto my desktop.
my anti virus picked up the virus right away.

i don't think the router can protect me from that.
it seems more toward stopping someone doing port scans and trying to break in.it can also not allow anything from specific addresses. but, then, so does a host file.

what a firewall does is to watch all the traffic that is going in and out of your network. (now that there is a router attached to your puter, you are now, officially a "network" ... although you've been part of a "network" all along: the internet.) it keeps track of what stuff is going to what addresses, and which stuff can or can not go to which addresses. so stuff from places that have come to gain a reputation can be blocked before it gets to your computer. lots of pop-ups and things come from specific places.

oh! here's something.

a router is a device to direct information between components in a network. such as between your computer and your modem.

a firewall is actually software running on a hardware device (whether it be a router or a computer) that "manages" the information flowing across/through the network and the router.

the router is hardware. the firewall is software. (you have to configure it!!)

no, the router, itself, prolly won't stop stuff. properly configuring the router, and setting up a set of firewall rules, will go a lot further toward stopping stuff.

i'll go find a copy of this router's manuals and help ya with the new stuff?

peace!

netgear FR114Psupport page (http://www.netgear.com/support/products/FR114P.asp)

the tests say i am fully stealthed.

the tests say i am fully stealthed.excellent!! all ports closed and none responding to anything from the outside. as far as anyone is concerned; you don't exist!! "security through obscurity": if they can't find ya, they can't (directly) infect ya!

oh! did you change the default username and password for the admin account on that router? that username and password are listed on the support page; everybody knows them!

excellent!! all ports closed and none responding to anything from the outside. as far as anyone is concerned; you don't exist!! "security through obscurity": if they can't find ya, they can't (directly) infect ya!

oh! did you change the default username and password for the admin account on that router? that username and password are listed on the support page; everybody knows them!
yeah, i set that up.
i'm secure against hackers but my concern is stuff being dropped on me via email or when i click a link.
i was hit last time because i clicked on a link that was a trap.
all i have for that is my anti virus and spyware software.

yeah, i set that up.
i'm secure against hackers but my concern is stuff being dropped on me via enmail or when i click a link.
i was hit last time because i clicked on a link that was a trap.
all i have for that is my anti virus and spyware software.

Wow bruh i'm impressed. Most people don't take the time to bone up on best practices like you did and even less turn around and implement them.

If you're concerned about links you're going to have to go a step further because you are correct you can still be vulnerable.

Take a look at the hyperlinked file below...copy all the content out and paste it in your:

c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts



If you have entries in your existing file hosts file make sure you don't overwrite them when you paste the new ones in.

All this is doing is blocking domains that are known to be up to no good, or spam, or ads, or spyware from being able to communicate with you over http.
Your just redirecting their traffic to local port - so they can't send down banner ads and your pc can't send your information back up to them.

Read through the first 100 or so lines of the file - it has comments that explain how this works.

Anything that has a # in front is a "comment" - meaning the line is not read by your network apps. You can remove the # for domains you want to block or add new ones to the file.

I use a version of this file from august-2005 that I've tweaked for my own use.

I'm including a link here to a more recent one though:
New hosts File (http://chelleden.com/Updatedhosts.txt)
If you find you're getting blocked from a site you WANT to hit just do a edit_ find on your hosts file, locate the domain you are getting blocked from, and put a comment (#) at the beginning.


Hope this helps.

yeah, i set that up.
i'm secure against hackers but my concern is stuff being dropped on me via email or when i click a link.
i was hit last time because i clicked on a link that was a trap.
all i have for that is my anti virus and spyware software.in email, i'd strongly suggest displaying mail as text rather than html. also, turn off javascript for mail.

i'd also suggest not using outlook or outlook express. the mozilla foundation offers thunderbird as a mail client. (that foundation grew out of the mozilla project and is responsible for firefox, moxilla, thunderbird, and, i believe there is a calendar program as well.) (i use mozilla because i like having that "suite" of programs; browser, email client, chat, composer. that was the same reason i used netscape instead of IE; not having to launch another program to read mail or news.)

and, yeah; that hosts file can mitigate the problems with some of those "trap links" by convincing your browser that the address that is associated with that link is your computer (127.0.0.1 or 0.0.0.0 - it's called localhost). since your computer doesn't have that stuff, eventually it will send an indication to your browser that that page is not found. with a large host file, sometimes this can slow the browsing experience just a little bit ... but not really enough to matter on "modern" machines.

the firewall in your router can block those sites from sending anything into your network, at all. (this would be called "ingress filtering". another useful aspect of firewalls is that some of them do "egress filtering"; blocking connection attempts out of your computer to certain sites.) have you begun exploring building firewall rules, yet?

and i will echo what brother kemetkind said; it IS impressive that you have made this step toward securing your computer!

Added links (http://destee.com/forums/showpost.php?p=386978&postcount=1) to Sysinternals.com.

Oops! I forgot something.

I've added the Mozilla products (http://www.mozilla.org/products/) page to the top of this thread (http://destee.com/forums/showpost.php?p=386978&postcount=1).

just in case anyone ever rescues a piece of "legacy" tech from a landfill that is so old it will only run windows versions that don't have the daylight saving time corrections:
2007 Daylight Savings Time Problem (http://www.uic.edu/depts/accc/systems/daylight/contents.html)