Zone Alarm Pro 4

[neo_maya]

Hi Everyone,

 

I don't know if any of you have any firewall, but a friend of mine said that apart from protecting my pc from outsiders (though I am not quite sure just who would want to mess around with my pc for fun) zone alarm pro will also stop ads and stop viruses and worms. So, I downloaded the software and installed it on my machine.

 

Everything was working just fine, but one fine day, I boot up my machine and norton says to me that it can't scan my e-mail messages because the network isn't configured properly. I tried to solve the problem, but couldn't and neither could my friend (he is sitting here showing his teeth). So, I tried uninstalling zone alarm and after I rebooted my machine I was once again surfing the net.

 

Then I reinstalled zone alarm and had the same problem (along with a dozen others which I think may have been caused by the software). So, I uninstalled it again and right now my pc (according to my friend is wide open to others to mess around with) is running without any firewall.

 

Do I need any firewall and if I do then can anyone please solve my little problem.

 

Are there any better options?

 

Thanks for reading this crap.

 

Neo

[Sayonara]

You ARE better protected with a firewall, but if you keep Windows (I assume that's your operating system) patched and up-to-date as soon as updates are available on http://www.windowsupdate.com then you will make it very difficult for anyone to actually do anything remotely.

 

Some worms and viruses (like Nimda and the recent MSBlast) scan for computers that are vulnerable - again if you have the update from MS then they can't affect you.

 

If uninstalling ZA resolved your network problems, try checking the FAQ and user documentation on their website to see if there are any known issues. It's also worth hitting google to find some consumer-end discussion on the way it works.

[JaKiri]

It's probably that zonealarm was misconfigured (relative to your setup) to stop some programs/ports that you don't want it to.

[neo_maya]

Hi,

 

Thanks.

 

I take back what I said. It seems that uninstalling the program doesn't work. The problem is still there and it shows up from time to time.

 

Please don't laugh at me for asking this question - what is this thing about ports ? I mean I thought that there are serial ports, parallel ones, usb ports. Are you guys talking about something else? Because every now and then I see features about hacking and stuff, and it says that one can hack through that open port or that one and so on.................................I am just a novice, I don't know anything about this stuff. But I am trying to learn. So a little help will be appreciated.

 

How do I solve my problem ?

 

Anyone knows about any sites from where I can download full features about computers as well as other stuff without jumping from one link to another..............I mean isn't there any site that has full article or even a book covering everything in details?

 

Any online library web address.....................................???

 

Neo

[bigjnorman]

ports are just what they sound like,

Your computer has some 65,000 ports.

If you send information from your computer out onto a network(the internet), it goes out of one of the ports.

If you recieve information from a network(internet) you recieve the information through one of these ports.

 

serial/parallel/usb ports are specific places (physical outlets on the back of your computer) where you can plug a device in (like a digital camera), they're basically called 'ports' because they allow data to be sent and recieved from your computer.

 

ports (0-1024) are called "well-known ports"...there is a specific use for each one of these ports...like port 80 is allways used for HTTP protocol (or surfing the internet)

 

ports higher than 1024 can be used by any program to communicate with some other program accross a network or even to another part of your computer.

 

malware is a generic name for programs that gather information from your computer and send it back to a specific place on the network(internet)...using a port.

 

trojans are programs that set ports on your computer to "listen" for incoming connections. the people who distribute these trojan programs can scan thousands upon thousands of computers at once to see if a specific port (the port their trojan uses) is "listening" for a connection. if so, then they can connect to your computer and probably do some harmful things to your computer.

 

 

To see a list of all the ports being used on your computer, do this....

1) go to Start-->Run

2) type in "cmd"

3) click "OK"

4) type in "netstat"

[neo_maya]

Thanks a lot.

[blike]

hrm, whats this "server.exe" on port 1243.exe

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

jk

[Dudde]

blike said in post #7 :

hrm, whats this "server.exe" on port 1243.exe

 

 

jk

 

that just reminded me (I don't know how) of the time my friend in A+ (he was the best one there at the time) asked me what explorer.exe did, and whether he should delete it or not to find out.

 

it was on a school computer, so I told him not to;)

too bad I didn't find his curiosity on his home computer

[bigjnorman]

you may want to check that out....server.exe

 

The problem with troubleshooting application (names) is that virus and trojan makers aren't stupid, they are not going to code a trojan and name it "bad_virus_program", they are gonna name it scvhost or rundll.dll or somthing like that to make it look legit.

[Sayonara]

I think the "jk" gives it away a bit ;-)

[bigjnorman]

best thing to do is download a third party utility that will display your running programs, and map your open ports to specific applications and even the application's path.

 

The trick is that you can have a bad program named after a legitimate program, but they cannot be in the same directory (eg. same name in the same folder)

[dethfire]

I use the free zone alarm and it works fine for my personal computer, what more do ya need?

[Cheetah]

A virus-control maybe?

 

Generaly I would say there are three ways to secure your computer:

 

- Keep all your software up to date (at least the software you run regularly and can communicate through the net)

- Have a good Anti-Virus program with updated virus-lists

- Have a good firewall configured properly

 

Any of those would make your computer more secure. All of them together would make it VERY secure.

[bigjnorman]

yes, anything more would be overkill unless you privicy is absolutely necessary.

[5614]

im using zone alarm 5.1.011.000

 

ist the latest one out, i just downloaded / installed it, i am having some problems though, mainly that it likes to disable my internet access, how can i stop this? additionally, how can i stop it blocking my ports? im having difficulties finding the advance options such as ports, program control lists etc.

 

(im new to the program, so sorry if its obvious, but i just cant see them!)

 

thanks

[5614]

it also blocks some images, on the odd occasion it lets me on the net, images are always missing, so i disable zone alarm, go back to norton, and all is fine again.... why?

[Dave]

ZoneAlarm and Norton have quite a few problems co-existing. I've had a major headache trying to work out what was causing my e-mail connections to timeout, until I realised ZoneAlarm was being a pain.

 

Your best bet is to check out the patches' changelogs and see if there's any fixes for your problems.

[5614]

so how did you fix your time out problem? i think i may be having similar problems.

[Dave]

I didn't have a timeout problem. My advice would be to either downgrade to a previous version or remove ZoneAlarm and get something else.

[5614]

trying to work out what was causing my e-mail connections to timeout, until I realised ZoneAlarm was being a pain.

 

but

 

I didn't have a timeout problem.

 

so what happened? i though ZA was causing your email to time out. me confused here!

 

but ok, i get rid of ZA whilsts i have norton

[Dave]

I disabled the e-mail checking thing in Norton.

[pulkit]

I had massive problems in configuring my zone alarm with my connection type. So finally I decided to get rid of it and installed this very nice freeware called Sygate Personal Firewall. It works perfectly well, ever since I installed it I have had no virus attacks. Plus it has no conflict issues with any software.

[5614]

ok, i've got rid of zone alarm...

 

I've never heard of Sygate Personal Firewall, is it any good? how do you know? does it have compatability problems with other software, esp. Norton internet security professional?

[Dave]

Erm, doesn't that have a personal firewall included with it?

[5614]

yes, but i was thinking of looking at replacements, additions of such... and zone alarm is popular, so i tried that, had a problem, which resulted in this conversation

 

and the fact that SP2 things, means im gonna disable the windows firewall.