ZoneAlarm Internet Security Utility - FREE !
 

www.zonelabs.com

I found this from a link at www.grc.com
A very interesting site itself.
Yes it is free!

I was wondering if anyone is using it?
It looks a very interesting program.
Any comments on this would be appreciated
Cheers

Downloaded it.
It seems excellent. I went back to the Gibson website to find that I am now 'stealth'!
There has got to be a catch somewhere, right???
If you find it please let me know.

What does it do?

Shuts your computer's curtains to prying eyes on the www who like to have a good look in at you,so to speak.
Plus quite a few other things it says.

http://www.pprune.org/ubb/NonCGI/confused.gif

(Just bringing this thread to the top of the list)

AGAIN
:)

BTW, a good FAQ for ZoneAlarm can be found here.

I think it was squiddley who put me onto this little gem in a previous, extremely informative post - belated thanks btw Squidders.
I have tried quite a few of the supposed firewall programs that have been touted and at the risk of being well and truly dudded at some future date I will give ZoneAlarm a huge thumbs up, from my experience with it.
For the minor inconvenience of having to "authorise" all your legitimate traffic during the early days of setting it up, you end up with a docile little doberman that sits quietly in the background, albeit with a lot of barking if the number of hits my machine takes from net burglars is anything to go by.
I hope not to be disappointed again like I was with Lockdown 2000 but I am quietly confident that this program is exceptionally good at what it does and there is even a 2.1 Beta version available now that may even be better.
In short - spend the money and get it NOW - after all, it IS free !!!!

Im using Nukenabber 2.9b myself. Is ZoneAlarm just another fancy "Nukenabber" doing essentialy the same thing or is it something much better?

Slasher - I have only used one of the earlier versions of Nukenabber so cannot make a direct comparison. The ZoneAlarm does SEEM to be far more active. It appears that some sites request information from your machine or attempt to send same, in the background and I am seeing Zone Alarm activity here. For us mugs it is all relative anyway I suppose but I feel a lot more comfortable with this program than I did with Nukenabber.

My daughters 17 year old boyfriend hacked around "Nukenabber", "NetBus detective" "BO Detect" and "Cleaner" in under two days, just for fun. He's impressed with ZoneAlarm as he hasn't got through it in six weeks. Most teenagers can hack any un-protected PC by the time they are 14. It isn't long before they can get around simple protection. A firewall that screens the PC from internet scanning makes the PC 'invisible' and so less susceptible to hacking. Entry attempts are logged as they try to transit any of the PCs ports. ZoneAlarm users who are recording a lot of access hits probably have trojans (or spy-software embedded in free-ware downloads) on board transmitting to their base through the firewall by permission granted to the host program. Their base station is then aware of the internet connection, it's address and the port in use. The biggest risk to ALL PCs is invasion via ICQ chat, when other participants can pass through the firewall to plant a trojan. ZoneAlarm blocks access during subsequent sessions but the door is open during the current session. I'm impressed with ZoneAlarm and so far have seen no ill effects.

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Through difficulties to the cinema

great reply Blacksheep and informative too. I am happy that the ZoneAlarm is earning it's keep but as I have only used Bo detect and AVP for resident trojan detection, I would be very interested to hear your recomendation for a worthwhile program to do this with.

Slasher.

ZoneAlarm is a different kind of product. Nukenabber gives you a warning that someone is attempting to access certain ports (which you have to specify yourself as I understand it) and has tracing tools built in. As far as I know, it does not actually BLOCK access. ZoneAlarm is a software firewall. It BLOCKS access and alerts you if you want it to. Unless you have specifically configured ZoneAlarm to allow internet access to a certain program the firewall will not permit a connection - which stops Trojans and Spyware sneakily communicating behind your back. If someone probes one of your ports, ZoneAlarm suppresses any response - effectively your computer plays dead to encourage the kiddie to try somewhere else.

So far, I haven't seen any unfavourable comments about ZoneAlarm. Give it a try.

SeldomFixit.

You might want to follow this link to see how you can detect trojans yourself.

Yeh Im sold on ZA. Checked out the sites nomenclature and it spoke of the problems of Nukenabber. Downloaded ZA and its great! I then deleted Nuke from my drive.
Thanks Zombie for your contribution. Id like to offer something in return if you havent already got them (both are freebies):

Neotrace: http://www.neoworx.com/

Atom time: http://www.atomtime.com/

Hi, just a quick question.

I have Norton AV 2000, but not a firewall. I update the AV every 2 weeks and scan my HD. Will this be enough to detect any "planted trojans"?

Well, it's obviously on your mind Snigs. If someone here said "Yep, your Norton thingie will do the job for you", would you really be happy? Remember that Norton AV will not stop some sad bastard accessing your PC and trashing your hard drive for the fun of it. Download ZA - peace of mind for free.

Mmmmm . . .

I downloaded ZA and set it up so it doesn't block ICQ or DialPad - oh yes, and McAfee Clinic too! Not too much activity spotted here, but I do seem to get "pinged" every now and then - who'd want MY data!!??!!

Got an interesting email this morning from someone with pseudonym "Arora" with an ISP that appears to be in GMT+5 (didn't think I knew anyone there!) and an attachment caled "Pretty Park.exe"

Ran the attachment through virus checker - no bad reports - but due to the circumstances of its arrival, I'm still not gonna run it!

Did "Arora" ([email protected]) get my name from someone else's circulation list? or perhaps there's another way that this can happen (the email address that I use normally is NOT the one that I use in "profiles", although that one is genuine too)

Any comments?? I'm rather intrigued!

Hey, I just got "pinged" again and noticed that the IP address ot the ping starts with the same two groups of digits as "Arora" - "212.100 . . ." I believe IP addresses are allocated on a roughly geographical basis - does that mean anything???

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Flight Sims, very expensive toys - but real fun to play with!



[This message has been edited by ExSimGuy (edited 11 April 2000).]

ExSimGuy

I suggest that you read this report from McAfee, and take the appropriate action.

DO NOT RUN THE ATTACHMENT

Oh, and it may be prudent to update your virus checker!

[This message has been edited by Snigs (edited 11 April 2000).]

Thanx Snigs,

No, I did not run it! I'm stoopid but not that much! I was pretty suspicious, even though I ran it against the VERY LATEST "McAfee online clinic" files (I updated them yesterday morning for that very reason) and it came up CLEAN according to the McAfee online service!

I have passed the URL that you sent me to a number of friends on my addres book who I know may open it without being so careful!

It's worth noting to everyone that opening ANY attachment, unless you ar 100% sure of it's safety, is a risky business! From what you sent me, it's a BUGGER to get rid of once you run the damn thing!

Thanx again!

ESG