Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

This is worrying, a report released 17th Aug on Zdnet: donââ‚Âà ‚¬ÃƒÂ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚¢t connect that new PC to the Internet before taking security precautions, researchers at the Internet Storm Centre warned Tuesday. link

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Last time I connected an unprotected PC to my BB connection at home, it was a matter of seconds rather than 20 minutes before it got Nimda all over it. This time round I had the firewall and anti virus install files saved from the last re-install...

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

This is why a router is such a great idea. It features Network Address Translation which acts like a hardware firewall & keeps out viruses which spread via Microsoft networking. If you don't have one then remove 'File & Printer Sharing' from your network connections before connecting the computer to the net. Enabling the Firewall in XP is also a good thing. In either case, the first thing to do on connecting is to head over to windows update & download all those security patches. Bring a book to read while you're waiting.

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

yep, when we got this pc, i plugged the ethernet cable in, ran the ntl cd, and just as we were half way through registering, we got the blaster worm... that wasn't fun i can tell you...

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Never a truer word spoken - my last reformat saw me downloading 64Mb of updates, and that's not including the huge SP2 :disturbd:

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

This is just general advice for everyone.....

If your xp cd permits - create a slipstreamed sp2 cd for the next time you have to reinstall.....

Ok so you still have to install some updates - but not the whole lot

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

Thank god this notebook's firewall is protecting my other computer :erm:

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Can you expand on that one about a slipstreamed sp2 CD, is it possible to save the updates to a folder so you can archive them to CD for the next time?

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Have a look here...

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1626

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

You can. Go to Windows Update, select "Administrator Options" then "Windows Update Catalogue. You need to know which updates you want though, it doesn't automatically find the missing ones.

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

It's not unpatched PCs - it's unpatched PCs with Windows operating systems greater than Windows 98 SE, particularly Windows XP. I can connect a Windows 98 SE PC to the Internet without problems.

XP for you - and still you love it :no:

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

So if everyone decided to abandon all common sense and switch to *nix then people who've been exploiting windows loopholes will start targetting the more popular OS, i.e. linux, then in a few years time you'll be going "Linux for you - and still you love it :no: "

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20
 

Re: Warning unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes
 

First, I should say that ALL operating systems are vulnerable to attack. Anyone who say's their OS is invulnerable is likely to get hacked.

Microsoft have made some stupid decisions in the past which have helped attackers, but they do seem to be taking security more seriously now. Especially with XP SP2 and Windows Server 2003. One particular problem is that in the past, the default install of Windows has turned everything on (I have lost count of the amount of times I have had to disable IIS while installing Windows Server 2000). Server 2K3 disables virtually everything, and asks the Administrator to turn on what they need. Far better idea. XPSP2 also turns on Automatic Updates by default, and nags you every 20 minutes if you disable it. Another good idea.

As Bifta says (above), I suspect the main reason that Windows is the most compromised operating system is not because it is inherantly any less secure than any other OS, but simply because it is the most popular.

Still, one thing that buys more time for patching. Install a good firewall.