At 11:32 12/06/00, you wrote:
>I suggest you read page 87 of this weeks (12-19-00) PCMAG. There is a VERY
>negative editorial concerning Lockdown 2000 by Bill Machrone.
>
>I recommend you remove Lockdown 2000 and install Sygate Personal Firewall.
>You can download it from http://www.sygate.com/free/spf_download.htm....
>
>Make sure you completely remove Lockdown 2000 before setting up another
>firewall in-order to recapture your resources.
>
>Mark Rode
>The NOSPIN Group
Hi Mark
I agree totally about Lockdown 2000. But I'm not so sure whether replacing
it with Sygate's product is such a good idea.
Just today (Dec. 6, 2000), on his website, Steve Gibson of Gibson Research
Corporation (an activist in the field of personal computer privacy and
security), said this about Sygate's firewall:
"I have received eMail from people telling me that Sygate Technologies
offers a completely free personal firewall. These people mistakenly compare
it with ZoneAlarm (which is, by the way, the ONLY FIREWALL I have not been
able to penetrate with [my utility] Leaktest - no matter what I have
tried).
These people aslo tell me that I should consider telling people about
Sygate's
firewall. I agree completely! People NEED to be told about Sygate's
firewall,
because they need to be warned away from it!"
"Another Significant Sygate Problem: ...Sygate users need to have another
serious problem brought to their attention: When I began testing Sygate's
offering I simply launched Internet Explorer. As I would hope from any
application aware, "internal extrusion management" firewall, a dialog box
popped up asking me whether I wanted to allow Internet Explorer to access
the Internet, but in the meantime, while I was reading the message,
Internet
Explorer was GRANTED FULL UNRESTRICTED ACCESS TO THE INTERNET! What? Huh?
This means that any Trojan horse or spyware program running in your
computer
will have unrestrained access to your Internet connection UNTIL you respond
to the Sygate firewall dialog box and say "no". If the spyware were to
deliberately wait until you were not using your machine - as the most
prevalent
spyware in the industry deliberately does - you would likely be away
from your
machine when the Sygate dialog pops up to ask. The Trojan horse or spyware
would then have free reign to do anything it chooses with your Internet
connection! What's also interesting is that Sygate knows they have this
problem. The dialog box that pops-up asks whether you would like to
CONTINUE
permitting the program to access the Internet. Gee, do I want to CONTINUE
ALLOWING some program I've probably never even heard of to "phone home?"
After describing how easy it was to get through Sygate's firewall, Steve
concluded "The Sygate firewall stands out due to its uniquely (so far as
I know) and incredibly poor protection."
The above information is from <http://grc.com/su-leaktest.htm>. The URL
is due to change to <http://grc.com/su-firewalls.htm> later tonight.
Regards,
Bill Cohane
The NOSPIN Group
Hi all that are interested in the topic of firewalls. I just had the great
fortune to hear Steve Gibson speak tonight at the Pasadena IBM user group.
Membership does indeed have its privileges. Bill's advice, above, to visit
www.grc.com and go to Shields Up is quite valid and relevant. He also
mentioned the author of Lockdown is, in a nutshell a, well I won't mention
what, but more interested in marketing and suing people than a good product.
Apparently after he introduced Shields Up, many unscrupulous types have seen
the Internet security issue as a fast buck, with little or no protection. He
demonstrated how bad Sygate is at not stopping "things" from leaving your
computer. I will reiterate Mr. Gibson's emphatic recommendation of Zone
Alarm as the only product of its type that is worth anything. He gave the
usual disclaimer of not being an investor or affiliated with Zone Labs.
Didn't have much good to say about Symantec's offerings either for net
security.
He also recommended Ad-Aware as the replacement for his OPT OUT. Had great
things to say about it. That is at www.lavasoft.de Also he mentioned that
there is a beta IE 5.5 security product that he really like for blocking
third party cookies. Available somewhere on the MS site.
And yes, his new site and new product, Leak Test will be up and running by
morning as he stated. A whopping 27k download. Always a good laugh at his
bloat ware. Written in assembly language as always.
Brad Loomis
Los Angeles, CA
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