Ethical Hacking

You're devoted to making your network secure. You've applied all the latest patches, updated your virus software, installed an intrusion-detection system, and double-checked the rules on the firewall(s). Nevertheless, you're still dogged by nagging questions. Have you done enough? Do you know all the weaknesses in your network? Are you truly safe from attackers? How can you know?

One way to know the enemy is to think like the enemy. To protect your network from hackers, you must think like one. In other words, you must learn to hack. Of course, hacking is illegal, so you must become part of a new breed called the ethical hacker.

What is ethical hacking?
The term ethical hacking, according to the EC-Council (International Council of Electronic Commerce Consultants), refers to security professionals who apply their hacking skills for defensive purposes. An ethical hacker is someone who attempts to hack a system or network in order to expose vulnerabilities. Ethical hackers work for the particular company they're attempting to hack, providing the company with details of their work.

The EC-Council is an organization specializing in training and certification for e-business consultants. It offers certification in a number of areas related to e-business. The Certified Ethical Hacker is one of the latest additions to its offerings.


How does one become an ethical hacker?
The EC-Council has put together a training course and associated certification for becoming an ethical hacker. The course is titled "Ethical Hacking and Countermeasures" and runs five days. The training consists of instructor-led comprehensive course material combined with hands-on laboratory exercises utilizing a wide assortment of hacking tools. Below is an outline of the topics covered:

• Foot-printing—Foot-printing is the process of gathering information about a machine or company you want to attack.
• Scanning—Scanning is the technique administrators are probably most familiar with. A port scanner is used against a target to determine what TCP and UDP ports are open on a system.
• Enumeration—The process of enumeration takes advantage of weaknesses in protocols, such as NetBIOS, to provide information about a network (e.g., users, groups, shares, and computer names).
• System-hacking—This module examines the techniques used to penetrate a system, such as password cracking, keystroke logging, and privilege escalation.
• Trojans and back doors—This module examines various Trojan and back-door programs, such as Back Orifice, and the methods used to trick users into installing the programs.
• Sniffers—Sniffing involves capturing network traffic using a tool such as Ethereal or NetMonitor. Once the traffic is captured, it can be analyzed for sensitive information such as passwords.
• Denial of Service (DoS)—DoS is one of the most popular types of Web site attacks. This module explains how the attack works and explains countermeasures.
• Social engineering—Social engineering is the process of gathering information from computer users by deceiving them and causing them to give out passwords or other information. There are no software tools to prevent this type of attack. This can be combatted only with user training and education.
• Session-hijacking—Session-hijacking is the process of “stealing” another user's TCP session. Once a legitimate user has established a session, the hacker can take over and "become" that user.
• Hacking Web servers—This module explores the techniques for attacking Web servers. It primarily delves into the vulnerabilities in Internet Information Services (IIS), since it is the most popular target.
• Web application vulnerabilities—This module examines the vulnerabilities in Web-based applications.
• Web-based password-cracking—This module explains the various Web-based authentication schemes and the weaknesses of each.
• SQL injection—This explores the weaknesses of SQL Server and explains the techniques and countermeasures for hacking SQL Server.
• Hacking wireless networks—Wireless network hacking has received much attention over the last several years as wireless networks grow in popularity. This module explains the various techniques and countermeasures involved in securing a wireless network.
• Viruses—This module discusses some of the more popular viruses that have infected systems over the last few years, gives insight into how the viruses operate, and discusses antivirus software.
• Novell and Linux hacking—Although most of the course focuses on weaknesses in the Microsoft OS, this module specifically examines hacking non-Microsoft systems such as Novell and Linux.
• Evading IDS and firewalls—This module examines IDS systems, firewalls, and honeypots, and explains the techniques used in each for protecting a network. It also examines the techniques for evading such systems and the countermeasures.
• Buffer overflows—Probably the most exploited weaknesses in software are buffer overflows. This module explains buffer overflow attacks and countermeasures.
• Cryptography—This module looks at the various methods of data encryption used over the Internet and examines the efforts required to crack them.

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Tried and Tested method to Recover Damaged CD / DVD

Well, there are many methods that can be used to recover damaged CDs but to recover DVDs is somewhat tougher, I have come across many software which claim to do the same but when I tried them, none of them was able to achieve the desired result.

So after banging my head for some time, I have come across one method that worked for me. I am just going to explain and then hope that maybe it would work for you too.

The tool I am going to use here is called CD Check. Well its a paid tool but you I happen to have copy which you can download here.

Whats better is that this tool is just 1.5 MB. Download and install.

This is how it looks


All you need to do is, click on check, once it checks the DVD, you can go ahead and click on Recover Button

You'll see something similar to below


Just specify an output folder and click continue, you should be good to go.

Please let me know if it worked

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How Hackers Breach Security

Hacking, cracking, and cyber crimes are hot topics these days and will continue to be for the foreseeable future. However, there are steps you can take to reduce your organization's threat level. The first step is to understand what risks, threats, and vulnerabilities currently exist in your environment. The second step is to learn as much as possible about the problems so you can formulate a solid response. The third step is to intelligently deploy your selected countermeasures and safeguards to erect protections around your most mission-critical assets. This white paper discusses ten common methods hackers use to breach your existing security.

Stealing Passwords
Security experts have been discussing the problems with password security for years. But it seems that few have listened and taken action to resolve those problems. If your IT environment controls authentication using passwords only, it is at greater risk for intrusion and hacking attacks than those that use some form of multifactor authentication.

The problem lies with the ever-increasing abilities of computers to process larger amounts of data in a smaller amount of time. A password is just a string of characters, typically only keyboard characters, which a person must remember and type into a computer terminal when required. Unfortunately, passwords that are too complex for a person to remember easily can be discovered by a cracking tool in a frighteningly short period of time. Dictionary attacks, brute force attacks, and hybrid attacks are all various methods used to guess or crack passwords. The only real protection against such threats is to make very long passwords or use multiple factors for authentication. Unfortunately, requiring ever longer passwords causes a reversing of security due to the human factor. People simply are not equipped to remember numerous long strings of chaotic characters.

But even with reasonably long passwords that people can remember, such as 12 to 16 characters, there are still other problems facing password-only authentication systems. These include:

• People who use the same password on multiple accounts, especially when some of those accounts are
• on public Internet sites with little to no security.
• People who write their passwords down and store them in obvious places. Writing down passwords is
• often encouraged by the need to frequently change passwords.
• The continued use of insecure protocols that transfer passwords in clear text, such as those used for
• Web surfing, e-mail, chat, file transfer, etc.
• The threat of software and hardware keystroke loggers.
• The problem of shoulder surfing or video surveillance

Password theft, password cracking, and even password guessing are still serious threats to IT environments. The best protection against these threats is to deploy multifactor authentication systems and to train personnel regarding safe password habits.

Trojan Horses
A Trojan horse is a continuing threat to all forms of IT communication. Basically, a Trojan horse is a malicious payload surreptitiously delivered inside a benign host. You are sure to have heard of some of the famous Trojan horse malicious payloads such as Back Orifice, NetBus, and SubSeven. But the real threat of Trojan horses is not the malicious payloads you know about, its ones you don't. A Trojan horse can be built or crafted by anyone with basic computer skills. Any malicious payload can be combined with any benign software to create a Trojan horse. There are countless ways of crafting and authoring tools designed to do just that. Thus, the real threat of Trojan horse attack is the unknown.

The malicious payload of a Trojan horse can be anything. This includes programs that destroy hard drives, corrupt files, record keystrokes, monitor network traffic, track Web usage, duplicate e-mails, allow remote control and remote access, transmit data files to others, launch attacks against other targets, plant proxy servers, host file sharing services, and more. Payloads can be grabbed off the Internet or can be just written code authored by the hacker. Then, this payload can be embedded into any benign software to create the Trojan horse. Common hosts include games, screensavers, greeting card systems, admin utilities, archive formats, and even documents.

All a Trojan horse attack needs to be successful is a single user to execute the host program. Once that is accomplished, the malicious payload is automatically launched as well, usually without any symptoms of unwanted activity. A Trojan horse could be delivered via e-mail as an attachment, it could be presented on a Web site as a download, or it could be placed on a removable media (memory card, CD/DVD, USB stick, floppy, etc.). In any case, your protections are automated malicious code detection tools, such as modern anti-virus protections and other specific forms of malware scanners, and user education.

Exploiting Defaults
Nothing makes attacking a target network easier than when that target is using the defaults set by the vendor or manufacturer. Many attack tools and exploit scripts assume that the target is configured using the default settings. Thus, one of the most effective and often overlooked security precautions is simply to change the defaults.

To see the scope of this problem, all you need to do is search the Internet for sites using the keywords "default passwords". There are numerous sites that catalog all of the default user names, passwords, access codes, settings, and naming conventions of every software and hardware IT product ever sold. It is your responsibility to know about the defaults of the products you deploy and make every effort to change those defaults to nonobvious alternatives.

But it is not just account and password defaults you need to be concerned with, there are also the installation defaults such as path names, folder names, components, services, configurations, and settings. Each and every possible customizable option should be considered for customization. Try to avoid installing operating systems into the default drives and folders set by the vendor. Don't install applications and other software into their "standard" locations. Don't accept the folder names offered by the installation scripts or wizards. The more you can customize your installations, configurations, and settings, the more your system will be incompatible with attack tools and exploitation scripts.

Man-in-the-Middle Attacks
Every single person reading this white paper has been a target of numerous man-in-the-middle attacks. A MITM attack occurs when an attacker is able to fool a user into establishing a communication link with a server or service through a rogue entity. The rogue entity is the system controlled by the hacker. It has been set up to intercept the communication between user and server without letting the user become aware that the misdirection attack has taken place. A MITM attack works by somehow fooling the user, their computer, or some part of the user's network into re-directing legitimate traffic to the illegitimate rogue system.

A MITM attack can be as simple as a phishing e-mail attack where a legitimate looking e-mail is sent to a user with a URL link pointed towards the rogue system instead of the real site. The rogue system has a look-alike interface that tricks the user into providing their logon credentials. The logon credentials are then duplicated and sent on to the real server. This action opens a link with the real server, allowing the user to interact with their resources without the knowledge that their communications have taken a detour through a malicious system that is eavesdropping on and possibly altering the traffic.

MITM attacks can also be waged using more complicated methods, including MAC (Media Access Control) duplication, ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) poisoning, router table poisoning, fake routing tables, DNS (Domain Name Server) query poisoning, DNS hijacking, rogue DNS servers, HOSTS file alteration, local DNS cache poisoning, and proxy re-routing. And that doesn't mention URL obfuscation, encoding, or manipulation that is often used to hide the link misdirection.

To protect yourself against MITM attacks, you need to avoid clicking on links found in e-mails. Furthermore, always verify that links from Web sites stay within trusted domains or still maintain SSL encryption. Also, deploy IDS (Intrusion Detection System) systems to monitor network traffic as well as DNS and local system alterations

Wireless Attacks
Wireless networks have the appeal of freedom from wires - the ability to be mobile within your office while maintaining network connectivity. Wireless networks are inexpensive to deploy and easy to install. Unfortunately, the true cost of wireless networking is not apparent until security is considered. It is often the case that the time, effort, and expense required to secure wireless networks is significantly more than deploying a traditional wired network.

Interference, DOS, hijacking, man-in-the-middle, eavesdropping, sniffing, and many more attacks are made simple for attackers when wireless networks are present. That doesn't even mention the issue that a secured wireless network (802.11a or 802.11g) will typically support under 14 Mbps of throughput, and then only under the most ideal transmission distances and conditions. Compare that with the standard of a minimum of 100 Mbps for a wired network, and the economy just doesn't make sense.

However, even if your organization does not officially sanction and deploy a wireless network, you may still have wireless network vulnerabilities. Many organizations have discovered that workers have taken it upon themselves to secretly deploy their own wireless network. They can do this by bringing in their own wireless access point (WAP), plugging in their desktop's network cable into the WAP, then re-connecting their desktop to one of the router/switch ports of the WAP. This retains their desktop's connection to the network, plus it adds wireless connectivity. All too often when an unapproved WAP is deployed, it is done with little or no security enabled on the WAP. Thus, a $50 WAP can easily open up a giant security hole in a multi-million dollar secured-wired network.

To combat unapproved wireless access points, a regular site survey needs to be performed. This can be done with a notebook using a wireless detector such as NetStumbler or with a dedicated hand-held device.

Doing their Homework
I don't mean that hackers break into your network by getting their school work done, but you might be surprised how much they learn from school about how to compromise security. Hackers, especially external hackers, learn how to overcome your security barriers by researching your organization. This process can be called reconnaissance, discovery, or footprinting. Ultimately, it is intensive, focused research into all information available about your organization from public and non-so-public resources.

If you've done any research or reading into warfare tactics, you are aware that the most important weapon you can have at your disposal is information. Hackers know this and spend considerable time and effort acquiring a complete arsenal. What is often disconcerting is how much your organization freely contributes to the hacker's weapon stockpile. Most organizations are hemorrhaging data; companies freely give away too much information that can be used against them in various types of logical and physical attacks. Here are just a few common examples of what a hacker can learn about your organization, often in minutes:

• The names of your top executives and any flashy employees you have by perusing your archive of press releases.
• The company address, phone number, and fax number from domain name registration.
• The service provider for Internet access through DNS lookup and traceroute.
• Employee home addresses, phone numbers, employment history, family members, previous addresses, criminal record, driving history, and more by looking up their names in various free and paid background research sites.
• The operating systems, major programs, programming languages, specialized platforms, network device vendors, and more from job site postings.
• Physical weaknesses, vantage points, lines of sight, entry ways, covert access paths, and more from satellite images of your company and employee addresses.
• Usernames, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, directory structure, filenames, OS type,Web server platform, scripting languages,Web application environments, and more from Web site scanners.
• Confidential documents accidentally posted to a Web site from archive.org and Google hacking.
• Flaws in your products, problems with staff, internal issues, company politics, and more from blogs, product reviews, company critiques, and competitive intelligence services.

As you can see, there is no end to the information that a hacker can obtain from public open sources. This list of examples is only a beginning. Each kernel of truth discovered often leads the hacker to unearth more. Often, a hacker will spend over 90% of their time in information-gathering activities. The more the attacker learns about the target, the easier the subsequent attack becomes.

As for defense, you are ultimately at a loss—mainly because it is already too late. Once information is out on the Internet, it is always out there. You can obviously clean up and sterilize any information resource currently under your direct control. You can even contact third-party information repositories to request that they change your information. Some online data systems, such as domain registrars, offer privacy and security services (for a fee, of course). You can also control or limit the output of information in the future by being more discrete in your announcements, product details, press releases, etc.

However, it is the information that you can't change or remove from the Internet that will continue to erode your security. The only way to manage uncontrollable information is to alter your environment so that it is no longer correct or relevant. Think of this as a new way to deviate from defaults or at least deviate from the previous known.

Monitoring Vulnerability Research
Hackers have access to the same vulnerability research that you do. They are able to read Web sites, discussion lists, blogs, and other public information services about known problems, issues, and vulnerabilities with hardware and software. The more the hacker can discover about possible attack points, the more likely it is that he can discover a weakness you've yet to patch, protect, or even become aware of.

To combat vulnerability research on the part of the hacker, you have to be just as vigilant as the hacker. You have to be looking for the problems in order to protect against them just as intently as the hacker is looking for problems to exploit. This means keeping watch on discussion groups and web sites from each and every vendor whose products your organization utilizes. Plus, you need to watch the third-party security oversight discussion groups and web sites to learn about issues that vendors are failing to make public or that don't yet have easy solutions. These include places like securityfocus.com, US CERT, hackerstorm.com, and hackerwatch.org

Being Patient and Persistent
Hacking into a company network is not typically an activity someone undertakes and completes in a short period of time. Hackers often research their targets for weeks or months, before starting their first tentative logical interactions against their target with scanners, banner-grabbing tools, and crawling utilities. And even then, their initial activities are mostly subtle probing to verify the data they gathered through their intensive "offline" research. Once hackers have crafted a profile of your organization, they must then select a specific attack point, design the attack, test and drill the attack, improve the attack, schedule the attack, and, finally, launch the attack.

In most cases, a hacker's goal is not to bang on your network so that you become aware of their attacks. Instead, a hacker's goal is to gain entry subtly so that you are unaware that a breach has actually taken place. The most devastating attacks are those that go undetected for extended periods of time, while the hacker has extensive control over the environment. An invasion can remain undetected nearly indefinitely if it is executed by a hacker who is patient and persistent. Hacking is often most successful when performed one small step at a time and with significant periods of time between each step attempt - at least up to the point of a successful breach. Once hackers have gained entry, they quickly deposit tools to hide their presence and grant them greater degrees of control over your environment. Once these hacker tools are planted, hidden, and made active, the hackers are free to come and go as they please.

Likewise, protecting against a hacker intrusion is also about patients and persistence. You must be able to watch even the most minor activities on your network with standard auditing processes as well as an auto-mated IDS/IPS system. Never allow any anomaly to go uninvestigated. Use common sense, follow the best business practices recommended by security professionals, and keep current on patches, updates, and system improvements.

However, realize that security is not a goal that can be fully obtained. There is no perfectly secure environment. Every security mechanism can be fooled, overcome, disabled, bypassed, exploited, or made worthless. Hacking successfully often means the hacker is more persistent than the security professional protecting an environment. Ultimately, it is an arms race to see who blinks or falls behind first. With enough time, the right tools, sufficient expertise and skill, mounting information collection, and persistence, a hacker can and will find a way to breach any and every security system.

Confidence Games
The good news about hacking today is that many security mechanisms are very effective against most hacking attempts. Firewalls, IDSes, IPSes, and anti-malware scanners have made intrusions and hacking a difficult task. However, the bad news is many hackers have expanded their idea of what hacking means to include social engineering: hackers are going after the weakest link in any organization's security—the people.

People are always the biggest problem with security because they are the only element within the secured environment that has the ability to choose to violate the rules. People can be coerced, tricked, duped, or forced into violating some aspect of the security system in order to grant a hacker access. The age-old problem of people exploiting other people by taking advantage of human nature has returned as a means to bypass modern security technology.

Protection against social engineering is primarily education. Training personnel about what to look for and to report all abnormal or awkward interactions can be effective countermeasures. But this is only true if everyone in the organization realizes that they are a social engineering target. In fact, the more a person believes that their position in the company is so minor that they would not be a worthwhile target, the more they are actually the preferred targets of the hacker.

Already Being on the Inside
All too often when hacking is discussed, it is assumed that the hacker is some unknown outsider. However, studies have shown that a majority of security violations actually are caused by internal employees. So, one of the most effective ways for a hacker to breach security is to be an employee. This can be read in two different ways. First, the hacker can get a job at the target company and then exploit that access once they gain the trust of the organization. Second, an existing employee can become disgruntled and choose to cause harm to the company as a form of revenge or retribution.

In either case, when someone on the inside decides to attack the company network, many of the security defenses erected against outside hacking and intrusion are often ineffective. Instead, internal defenses specific to managing internal threats need to be deployed. This could include keystroke monitoring, tighter enforcement of the principle of least privilege, preventing users from installing software, not allowing any external removable media source, disabling all USB ports, extensive auditing, host-based IDS/IPS, and Internet filtering and monitoring.



There are many possible ways that a hacker can gain access to a seemingly secured environment. It is the responsibility of everyone within an organization to support security efforts and to watch for abnormal events. We need to secure IT environments to the best of our abilities and budgets while watching for the inevitable breach attempt. In this continuing arms race, vigilance is required, persistence is necessary, and knowledge is invaluable.

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Windows Vista: Is it secure enough for business?

Microsoft’s latest desktop operating system, Windows Vista, contains a wide range of new features, from the user interface to the heart of the operating system. However, it is the new security-related technologies which were given top priority by Microsoft in response to the many criticisms of the vulnerabilities in Vista’s forerunner, Windows XP. Developments include improved monitoring and reporting on security status, minimized opportunity for attack and improved defense against spyware. There is also a new mechanism to prevent rogue code from being able to make malicious changes to the operating system kernel, and improved browser and firewall functionality.

Windows Security Center

Windows Security Center (WSC) runs in the background, monitoring and reporting on the security status of a computer. First introduced by Microsoft in Windows XP Service Pack 2, the enhanced version in Vista provides greater integration both with other Vista security features and with third-party security solutions.

As with Windows XP, WSC monitors the internet firewall and checks the status of automatic updates and anti-virus software but it has been extended in Vista to include monitoring of anti-spyware applications. Monitoring of the security settings in Internet Explorer 7 and of the new User Account Control function (see below) has also been added.

Part of the reasoning behind the enhancements to WSC is to raise end-user awareness of security issues by alerting them to any problems. While this clearly has home-user benefits, businesses and other organizations like education and government institutions will find this both insufficient and annoying and so might well choose to disable these
end-user alerts.

In addition, some security vendors have reacted negatively to the fact that WSC cannot be automatically disabled when their alternative security solutions are installed, although Sophos cannot see why any vendor should object to a built-in security center reporting on the status of its software.

User Account Control

User Account Control (UAC) is one of the most important security features in Windows Vista. Its objective is to minimize the opportunity for attack, preventing the installation of today’s malware threats, in a scenario where end users are given local administrator rights. As with Windows XP, end users are given administrator rights by default. However, instead of invoking administrator status in a blanket fashion across all applications, the Vista login generates two security tokens: StandardUser and Administrator.

By default, Vista assigns the StandardUser token to applications, so applications that do not require administrator rights will run with no user intervention. However, many applications require administrator privileges and in this case the Administrator token is invoked and the user is asked to cancel or allow the program as appropriate, as shown in the figure.


From a security point of view UAC is a significant step forward and the principle of the least required privilege is theoretically a good one as, by default, registry and file system access are restricted. This means that malware is prevented from automatically copying itself to locations such as the Windows system folder and cannot be written to registry keys in order to be automatically launched by the operating system. The principle of the StandardUser token also prevents malicious applications from writing to the memory space of other processes, a technique commonly used by malware to bypass personal or client firewalls.

Unfortunately UAC is not just secure but intrusive, with a high level of alerts, many of which are not intuitive for non-technical users. The danger is that they will automatically select “Allow” when prompted, without fully considering whether they should. The other danger is that UAC can be disabled – and indeed many beta testers chose to do this – which removes the improved security.

Windows Defender

Windows Defender is a free anti-spyware program built into Windows Vista that will detect and remove some adware, spyware and other unwanted programs. The software uses automatic updates provided by Microsoft analysts to help detect and remove new threats as they are identified. This protection does not offer comprehensive antimalware protection, in spite of the fact that the information in WSC implies that it does.

Windows Defender only supports Windows XP Service Pack 2 or later, or Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 or later. It does not support other operating systems including Windows 95/98/Me and 2000. And because it is targeted at the consumer market it does not offer any central administration capabilities. So it offers little to multi-platform, centrally managed enterprise networks.


Kernel protection

Two new mechanisms have been introduced to protect the operating system kernel – Kernel Patch Protection (KPP), or PatchGuard, and mandatory signing of drivers.

KPP has been implemented in 64-bit Vista to prevent a particular type of malicious activity that manipulates the operating system kernel, causing serious security breaches and adversely impacting the stability, reliability and performance of the operating system and user applications. Commonly known as “rootkits” this type of malware is often used to hide other potentially unwanted software, such as bots and spyware. KPP prevents kernel mode drivers from extending or replacing operating system services and should therefore stop rogue drivers from making malicious changes to the kernel.

KPP has not been added to 32-bit Vista since many programs (including security software) use the kernel space in an undocumented way and Microsoft was concerned about compatibility with the existing application set. This means that 32-bit systems remain vulnerable to rootkit attack. However, the second kernel protection mechanism – mandatory signing of drivers – has been implemented in both 32-bit and 64-bit Vista and can be set to prevent unsigned drivers from loading.

Some security vendors have complained that they are being “locked out” of the Vista operating system kernel by KPP. This is because they need to be able to make changes inside Microsoft’s kernel in order to ensure their existing products can support 64-bit versions.

While it is true that there will now be some dependency on Microsoft to deliver kernel interfaces which could slow all security vendors down, this is more than compensated for by the additional security offered by a locked down kernel. Windows Vista with KPP is a step in the right direction for customers – although, since this is a software mechanism it is quite likely that it will be circumvented by malware writers sooner or later – and security vendors should embrace and work with it rather than fight it.


Internet Explorer 7

Windows Vista’s built-in web browser, Internet Explorer 7 (IE7), includes security enhancements designed to protect users from phishing and spoofing attacks. In protected mode it helps prevent data and configuration settings from being deleted or changed by malicious websites or malware.

The feature is enforced by a new mechanism, called Mandatory Integrity Control, whereby every process has an integrity level assigned and each level limits access to system objects (registry, file system, other processes. etc).

The new IE7 protected mode actually runs IE with the integrity level “Low” – which is lower than the default for most user processes. This happens for all security zones except the trusted zone. Downloaded programs inherit the low integrity level which should prevent malicious programs and PUAs from infecting the system and integrating with the browser.

IE7 also has a phishing filter, which helps users browse more safely by advising them when websites might be attempting to steal their confidential information. The filter works by analyzing website content, looking for known characteristics of phishing techniques and using a global network of data sources to decide if the website should be trusted.


Windows Firewall

Windows Vista includes a new firewall that goes beyond the Windows XP Service Pack 2 firewall. Application-aware outbound filtering has been added as have location-based profiles, which allow users to set up different rules based on the network location.

However, the default policy is still to allow all outgoing traffic and the default settings will not provide any additional protection over the firewall in XP SP2.

In addition, although some management is available through Group Policy, the central management function does not provide enterprise administrators with the visibility, monitoring, policy configuration and rapid response capability that enterprise-level security management consoles deliver.

Other security features

Windows Vista also includes improved Wi-Fi security, readiness for multi-factor authentication, BitLocker data protection, a Network Access Protection client, and improved auditing for compliance.

In Windows Vista, wireless networking is more secure by default, and includes support for the latest and most secure wireless networking protocol, Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2).

Windows Vista comes with an API to make it easier to add smart card and other systems such as biometrics to Windows authentication, to make it harder for hackers to gain access to computers and data through password cracking or social engineering techniques.

Enhanced encryption enables organizations to protect against theft or loss of corporate intellectual property. Windows Vista has improved support for data protection at the document, file, directory, and machine level, including the ability to define which employees have access to certain data. Encryption keys can now be stored on smart cards. The BitLocker disk encryption system provides some protection against hacking attacks that involve booting from removable disks.

The Network Access Protection (NAP) client can be used to prevent rogue or unprotected computers gaining full access to a network, although it will only really be implementable once the necessary server components are released with the next release of Windows Server, codenamed Longhorn, expected to be released soon.

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10 security blunders

While one of the following links is actually from early 2008, they all refer to issues that arose during the year of 2007.

1. The UK privacy breach: An employee of Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs Office mailed two CDs containing confidential data on about 25 million UK citizens, including names, addresses, insurance account numbers, and bank account details for claimants in the national child benefit database. These CDs never made it to their destination. Just in case you think someone having your bank account number is no big deal, you should read about what happened to Top Gear TV series host Jeremy Clarkson when he published his account information in a newspaper to “prove” that having someone’s bank account will do nothing for a malicious party. At least Clarkson owned up to the mistake and started advocating disincentives for such poor security practice. I particularly like when he said “we must go after the idiots who lost the discs and stick cocktail sticks in their eyes until they beg for mercy.”
2. Embassies confuse anonymity with security: Swedish security consultant Dan Egerstad showed that people all over the world, most notably certain embassies, tend to assume that using the Tor anonymizing network means they’re secure. Somehow, they’ve missed the importance of encryption to protect their data. One must wonder why governments are so bad at security. By the way, the Swedish equivalents to the FBI and CIA raided Egerstad’s apartment for undisclosed reasons, accused him of several crimes, then released him without charges.
3. The iPhone runs everything as root: As Wired put it, IPhone’s Security Rivals Windows 95. This is very bad — and, of course, the root password for the iPhone was cracked in just three days. It had to happen eventually. To be fair, Windows Mobile devices all run everything as the administrative user as well, but this is not exactly unexpected (so it’s less notable). Credit to the fine folks at Metasploit for figuring it out, and figuring out how to make use of that fact.
4. Sears installs spyware on customer computers: The depth and breadth of harvested data is truly frightening, and you just have to read it to believe it. Do not join the “My SHC Community”. Worse yet, if you follow the update link at the beginning of the article, you’ll find out that Sears (KMart is involved, too) is playing some pretty sketchy games with privacy policy presentation, based on whether the spyware is installed on your system. Considering this example, that’s probably reason enough to avoid ever getting mixed up in any online Sears community, but that’s not all. . . .
5. Your Sears buying habits may be public knowledge: In short, by joining the Sears “Manage My Home” community, you can search through the Sears purchase history of anyone whose name and address you know. Not only should you avoid joining online Sears communities but, it seems, you should avoid shopping there as well. Apparently, major corporations are as bad as government agencies when it comes to security — especially Sears.

Old News

What follows is a list of older news items, from before 2007, that are still interesting and worth knowing about.

1. Switching from Unix to MS Windows proves disastrous for air traffic control: A problem with a Microsoft Windows 2000 solution used to replace Unix air traffic control servers required regular restarts — and when the restart was overlooked once, it endangered 800 commercial aircraft in 2004.
2. MS Windows crash cripples UK government agency: Only a couple months after the air traffic control debacle, almost the entire UK Department of Work and Pensions network crashed. This event was called the biggest crash in public sector history.
3. The Pentagon improperly redacted text in a declassified document: Text was masked in a PDF by painting black lines over it, as if a physical, hardcopy, paper document had a black marker run over the relevant sections of text. Of course, doing that with Adobe Acrobat tends to leave all the text intact and recoverable, as such black “painting” occurs on a separate document layer. A Greek medical student at Bologna University recovered the obscured text with a couple of mouse clicks in 2005.
4. The VA privacy breach: More than 26 million US military veterans’ personal data — including names, birthdates, and social security numbers — were taken home by a Veterans Administration employee. As necessitated by Murphy’s Law, the data was stolen (of course). It was stored on an unencrypted drive in the employee’s laptop but, surprisingly, it seems the thieves did not know what they had and the data was not used for identity theft purposes.
5. Sony may have the worst consumer security record of any corporation: The six-part Boing Boing series on Sony’s “anti-consumer technology” problems makes a compelling case for getting your technology from anyone but Sony. If you thought the 2005 Sony rootkit was the only problem, you haven’t been paying attention — the rootkit installed even if you told it not to, there was a second Sony rootkit, the rootkit remover itself caused security issues, and the RIAA said it’s no big deal because other record labels also install rootkits. Somehow, I do not find that very reassuring

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Configuring Linux using a GUI

Many hardcore Linux users would shudder at the thought of configuring Linux network services using a GUI. A solid argument could be made that a GUI has no place being on a server in the first place. Servers are just supposed to sit quietly in the corner and do their job by themselves without user interaction. GUIs, by definition, are designed to make user interaction easier. A GUI adds needless overhead to a machine that’s not supposed to be interacting with users from its own console. Therefore, you should keep a GUI off of the server and configure services to run from a command line.

Although it’s practically sacrilegious, using a GUI for configuring servers can make sense in some cases. Primarily, using a GUI can help network administrators who aren’t familiar with Linux learn to set up network services faster. Many network administrators come from a Windows background, where practically everything is point-and-click. Although they need to earn new tools, the old Windows skills can more easily be translated to Linux through GUI tools.

Even for seasoned Linux users, trying to figure out the locations, layouts, and choices of configuration files that need to be maintained can be a chore. Some services can use three or four different .conf files. A slight error in the file can cause the service to fail. If the error was overlooked, a lot of time can be lost to troubleshooting. GUI tools that automatically find and populate the corresponding .conf files can end confusion and decrease the chance of errors.

GUI configuration options
Linux gives you several options when it comes to GUI-based network administration. Since the distribution we’ve chosen to use in this series revolves around SuSE 10.2, the major GUI configuration tool you’ll use is YaST. Other distributions have their own tools, but YaST is very well-organized, with an easy-to-follow arrangement.

YaST does a lot, but it doesn’t do it all. For those services YaST can’t control, we’re going to use Webmin, an add-on tool which allows you to control Linux services from inside of a Web browser. This means you have to learn how to use another tool, but it’s still easier than doing configurations from the command line.

A quick look around YaST
Although it is contrary to what many Linux admins would advise, I’m going to log into my SuSE 10.2 machine as root for this setup. I don’t do this often, but it saves me from having to enter the root password each time I perform an administration task.
Once you are done setting up these services, log out.

The first thing you’ll want to do is to select the Computer menu

The new GNOME 2.16 menu is quite a change from the usual cascading menu.

From the menu, select Control Center.

The Control Center is grouped in both Groups and Common Tasks.

From the Common Tasks section, select Administrator Settings to open the YaST
Admin Tool. You’ll see a screen similar to the figure below

It should be obvious that Network Services is your next destination.

Select Network Services to reveal a listing of the various Network Services that can
be configured from within YaST.

A nice collection of GUI tools to help you configure your Linux server.

Working with Webmin
There are a number of ways to go about the installation of Webmin, but the easiest and most consistent method of installing Webmin is from source. To get the source tarball, go to sourceforge site for the latest release. Once you have that file downloaded, you are going to untar the archive with the command tar xvzf webmin-1.310.tar.gz.

Now cd into the newly created webmin-1.310 directory. Inside this directory is the setup script to install Webmin. From within this directory, run the command ./setup.sh /var/www/html/webmin (where /var/www/html/webmin is the directory you wish to install
Webmin into).
Note: The /var/www/html/webmin directory does not have to exist, because the Webmin setup script will create it for you.

While the installation script is running, it is going to ask you the following:

• Webmin configuration directory
• The location at which Webmin will store logs
• Path to Perl
• Your server OS (Webmin tries to detect this)
• The port Webmin will run on (defaults to 10,000)
• The username and password to log in to Webmin
• Your server’s hostname (Webmin tries to detect this)
• SSL usage; should only prompt if Perl’s SSL libraries are installed (this author has not run Webmin under SSL)
• Whether you want Webmin to start with system boot (highly recommended)

An interesting gotcha: During installation on Fedora Core 6, I was only asked for the installation directory. I was not prompted for a password, server hostname, server OS, port number, path to Perl, or SSL usage. Initially, it caused many an eyebrow lift when I logged into the site without an admin password.

I tried using the root username and password for my system; it worked. I attribute
this to Webmin being previously installed (but not run) via RPM. After the installation
script completed, it informed me:
Webmin has been installed and started successfully. Use your web browser to go to
http://localhost.localdomain:10000/
and login with the name and password you entered previously.
Because Webmin uses SSL for encryption only, the certificate it uses is not signed by one of the recognized CAs such as Verisign. When you first connect to the Webmin server, your browser will ask you if you want to accept the certificate presented, as it does not recognize the CA. Say yes.
The directory from the previous version of Webmin /usr/libexec/webmin Can now be safely deleted to free up disk space, assuming that all third-party modules have been copied to the new version.

The last section of the presented information was a good hint as to why I was not given the chance to set up an admin.
Now that Webmin is installed, it’s time to take a peek around and see what it has to offer.

Logging in
As stated above, you may have to log in with your root username and password.
Once logged in, you will be greeted with the Webmin main page.

Webmin’s main administration page.

From there, the first place to visit is the Webmin Configuration screen.

Here you can configure Webmin options.

Security configurations
From within the Webmin configuration screen, there are a number of items you will want to set up. Obviously, security for such a tool is high on the list. Select the IP Access Control link to set up a list of allowed or denied hosts; this prevents password guessing. You may have set up a rigid password that’s a mixture of alpha and numeric characters (as well as upper and lower case), but eventually someone’s going to crack it.

To add one more layer of security, set up this list so you allow only specific IP addresses to access the tool. Make sure you include any known safe IP address that will be needing access to the Webmin interface. All other hosts are denied.

Along this same line of security, select the Trusted Referrers link. From here, you can configure Webmin’s referrer-checking support, which ensures that malicious links from other sites cannot trick your browser into doing dangerous things with Webmin. In this section, there is a text area where you can enter trusted sites, a radio selection, and a check box. The radio selection allows you to choose to Enable Referrer Checking, and the check box allows you to select to Trust Links From Unknown Referrers.

From everything I’ve read and experienced, the default configuration for Webmin is pretty secure. For those working with mission-critical servers, however, it might befit you to uncheck the Trust Links From Unknown Referrers box, and configure some trusted Web sites.

The next step in securing Webmin is enabling the system to use SSL tunnels; this will allow remote login without passing unencrypted passwords across the ether. However, there are steps that must be taken before this feature can be used. First, OpenSSL must be installed; on many newer distributions, this is already taken care of. If not, then download the most recent OpenSSL from rpmfind and run the command (as root) rpm -ivhopenssl-XXX.rpm (where XXX is the release number).

With OpenSSL installed, you must install the Net::SSLeay Perl module. Download this module from the Net::SSLeay site, untar the archive with the command tar xvzf Net_SSLeay.pm-XXX.tar.gz (where XXX is the release number), change into the newly created Net::SSLeay directory, run the command perl Makefile.PL, and run the command make install.

To test the installation, run the command:perl -e ‘use Net::SSLeay’. If no errors are reported, you are good to go.

Select the SSL Encryption link from within the Webmin Configuration page, and you should see the following text, indicating SSL is working properly:
The host on which Webmin is running appears to have the SSLeay Perl module installed.

The first thing you want to verify is whether Enable SSL If Available? is checked. If it is, then you should now be able to log in to your Webmin site with the URL https://localhost.localdomain:10000/.

Your Webmin login is now encrypted.

Webmin users
Creating Webmin users is a very important task and should not be taken lightly. It’s necessary to grant users access to various aspects of your Webmin server (especially if your company’s server farm can not be administered by one person alone).

However, as in any good UNIX environment, users should be created and maintained wisely. To make this an easier task, I suggest creating groups to suit your needs. Say, for example, you have an IT team that needs access to the Webmin interface. From the Webmin main menu, select Webmin Users. Inside this page, Webmin Groups can be administered. Select Create New Webmin Group to create a new group.

From the list of options, select which modules the IT group needs to have access to, and press Save. Now, go to the Create Webmin User section, and create a new user. During this configuration, select the IT group from the Member Of Group list. There are some nice configuration options here, such as allowing users access to the site only on given days and times. Once you Save, the user will be created, and the user will inherit all of the options from the IT group.

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Tweaks, tricks, and hacks to make Windows Vista faster

Every operating system could stand some tweaking. No matter how many developers you throw at an OS as complicated as Windows Vista, power users will always find something they can modify or hack to make it run faster, or better, or just differently. Here are just a few of the Windows Vista tweaks, tricks, and hacks discovered so far.

1. Add the Run command to the Start Menu

Beginning way back with the release of Windows 1.0, Microsoft has been all about the GUI interface (more or less effectively). But sometimes you just want to run a program without having to navigate the GUI maze of menus and folders. Windows Vista, by default, does not include the Run command on the Start Menu. This was a common and favorite feature of Windows XP.

To add the Run command back to the Vista Start Menu, follow these steps:

1. Right click the Taskbar in an open area
2. Click on Properties

Click on the Start Menu tab (See Figure)

Taskbar and Start Menu Properties

3. Click the Customize button to get to the Customize Start Menu

Scroll down the list until you find the Run command checkbox and check it (See Figure).

4. Click OK and the Run command will now appear on the Start Menu.

Customize Start Menu

2. Disable the Welcome Center and Sidebar

The Windows Vista default setting is to show the Welcome Center on startup. While the Welcome Center is mildly interesting the first time you see it, you will quickly tire of it appearing every time you boot your Vista PC. This behavior is easily changed by unchecking the Run a Startup button located at the bottom of the Welcome Center as shown in Figure.

Welcome Center

Similarly, the Vista Sidebar is also on by default. While some users will find the Sidebar and its widgets useful, many will desire the desktop real estate and underlying resources for other more productive uses. You can turn the Sidebar off by:

1. Right clicking the Windows Sidebar icon in the system tray
2. Click Properties
3. Uncheck the Start Sidebar when Windows starts checkbox (See Figure)
4. Click OK

Windows Sidebar Properties

3: Change the Product Key

A Windows Vista installation disk essentially has all of the various editions of Vista included on that one disk. Which version gets installed is dependent on what product key you enter during the installation process. At some point you may want to upgrade your current version to a version with more bells and whistles, which would require a new Product Key.

Or you may want to Activate your Windows Vista under a different Product Key for some reason. The easiest way to change your Product Key is through the System applet in the Control Panel.

System applet

Under the Windows Activation section there is a link: Change Product Key. Clicking that link brings up the screen shown in Figure where you can enter in a different Product Key.

Windows Activation

4: Start Windows Explorer at somewhere other than documents

While Windows Vista has desktop search that will theoretically allow you the option of merely typing in a location on your hard disk to get an Explorer view, some users will undoubtedly prefer to use Windows Explorer. By default, Windows Explorer in Vista shows you the files located in the user Documents folder. Follow these steps to have Windows Explorer start in a different folder:

1. Copy the Windows Explorer shortcut, usually found in the Start Menu under Accessories, to the Desktop.
2. Right click the shortcut and click properties.

3. Click on the Shortcut tab to get the window shown in Figure.

Windows Explorer Properties

4. Change the Target filed to the desired location.

For example, to have Windows Explorer start at C:\ type in"
C:\Windows\explorer.exe /n, /e, c:\

5. Click OK

5: Privacy tweak

As a convenience, Windows Vista by default saves and displays a list of recently opened files and programs on the Start Menu. Ostensibly, this is supposed to make it easier to find a file or program. However, many users would prefer that information to remain hidden. Here is how to turn it off:

1. Right click the Taskbar and click Properties on the resulting menu
2. Click the Start Menu tab
Uncheck the checkboxes under Privacy (See Figure)
3. Click OK

Privacy settings

6: Smaller icons on Start Menu

The icons located on the Windows Vista Start Menu default to large.

Large icons

For many users, the personal preference will be for those icons to be much smaller. Here is how:

1. Right click the Taskbar and click on Properties
2. Click the Start Menu tab
3. Click the Customize button
4. Scroll down to the bottom of the list
5. Uncheck the Use large icons checkbox
6. Click OK twice

No more large icons

7. Add Internet Explorer to the Vista Desktop

For some reason known only to the Windows Vista development team, there is no easy option to add the Windows Explorer icon to the Vista Desktop. You can add Computer, Recycle Bin, and the Control Panel --- perhaps someone can explain that to us. In the meantime, if you want to add Internet Explorer you can do it with a Registry hack. Before editing the Windows Registry it is always advisable to make a backup of the Registry file.

1. Click the Start button
2. Open the Run dialog box (or type regedit in to the search box on the Start Menu)
3. Type in regedit and press Enter
4. Navigate to the following registry key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\HideDesktopIcons\NewStartPanel
5. Create a new DWORD 32-bit by right clicking in the key area
6. Copy this as the key name including the brackets:
{871C5380-42A0-1069-A2EA-08002B30309D}
7. Close regedit
8. Right click on the Desktop and click the Refresh menu entry --- Internet Explorer should now appear.

Regedit Internet Explorer

8: Change Security Center notifications

One of the most often leveled criticisms of Windows has been its lack of security. To overcome that perception Microsoft had programmed Vista to complain loudly and often if it discovers your malware, firewall or virus protection software is off or requires maintenance. For many users, the constant badgering to update your virus definitions is more annoying then effective. To calm Vista down a bit you can change the way you are notified of potential lax security.

Open the control panel and click the Windows Security Center.

Windows Security Center

Click the link Change the way Security Center alerts me to reach the dialog box
Choose you preference for notification

Chose your preference

9: Set Folder options

One of the first things experienced users change when they get a new Windows computer is change the Folder View options to a preferred setting. Windows Vista is no exception to this rule.

1. Open the Control Panel and click on the Folder Options icon
2. Click on the View tab

Folder options

3. Check or uncheck your folder preferences --- some suggestions:

• Check show hidden files and folders
• Uncheck Hide extensions for known file types
• Uncheck protected operating system files

10: Adjust power settings

By default, Windows Vista sets the power options to what it calls a "Balanced" plan. While for many users this plan will be adequate, there are many who will want to make adjustments. For laptop users specifically, settings can vary greatly when operating on battery power versus plugged into an outlet. To adjust power settings:

Open the Control Panel and then click the Power Options icon

Power Options

Click on the Change Plan Settings under one of the default plans to make changes

Power settings

For additional fine tuning click Change advanced power settings

Advanced power settings

11: Reduce Desktop Icons

By default, the Windows Vista Aero GUI uses what it classifies as "Medium" icons on the Desktop. Medium in this case is really quite large. (There is also a Large icon setting, but we won't go there.) To bring the icons back to a less eye-popping size:

1. Right click on the Desktop
2. Choose the View menu item
3. Change to Classic Icons

Classic

12 Add another time zone

For many of us working away from home offices at satellite offices, home or on the road, knowing the time across various time zones can be a necessary evil. Windows Vista will allow you to keep time in two additional time zones to the machine time.

1. Right click on the time display located in Taskbar System Tray
2. Select the Adjust Date/Time menu item
3. Click on the Additional Clocks tab

Add clocks

4. Choose a time zone
5. Click the checkbox next to Show this clock
6. Click OK

Now when you mouse over the time in the Taskbar System Tray you will get the time in your chosen time zones.

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Open Web proxies, the base for malware attacks

Advertising and click-through fraud is currently topping the list of malicious activity funnelled through open proxy servers, followed by junk email, according to a research project deploying fake open proxies to catch crooks

The research was carried out by the Web Application Security Consortium (WASC) using a network of virtual Apache proxy servers running on VMware and deploying an array of tools to identify, log and block traffic. The project started off with servers in seven countries in January, and has now expanded into 14 countries.

Open proxies are a frequent means by which attackers and scammers cover their tracks, making such traffic difficult to identify and trace. The WASC's approach gives researchers an insight into exactly what is passing through such servers.

When malicious traffic is identified, the honeypot servers block it and feed spoofed information back to the attackers, such as HTTP status codes, according to Ryan Barnett, director of application security training for Breach Security and head of the WASC's Distributed Open Proxy Honeypots project.

Click fraud traffic, employed to distort results from click-throughs to web ads or other commercial links, led malicious activity during the month of October, with 2.6 million requests. That compares to 158,000 requests for the entirety of the January-April period.

Spam followed with nearly two million requests, compared to slightly more than 109,600 in January-April. Most of the attacks are automated, WASC said.

The most serious attacks measured by the WASC's honeypots were designed to implant malicious Javascript code into often legitimate websites. Malicious Javascript is often used to exploit known browser flaws, in order to install malware onto client machines.

The project also noted an extensive scan designed to break into the email accounts of a popular Internet service provider.

The scan, using a method called distributed reverse brute force authentication, is distributed across hundreds of unique email authentication hosts in order to evade detection.

The technique involves checking a large number of different email usernames to see if they match specific common passwords. By "cracking" the username rather than the password, the attackers can evade many ordinary security defences.

Even if the attack doesn't allow the attackers to break into email accounts, it yields a list of valid email accounts that can be used for spamming purposes.

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Cafe Latte and AP-less WEP cracking

During the ToorCon 9 conference-where security experts get together with the hacking community to discuss new vulnerabilities-security researcher Viviek Ramachandran demonstrated an innovative technique used to compromise networks encrypted with WEP. I can just hear the comments “old news, nobody uses that anymore.” Surprisingly, WEP is still used by many businesses due to legacy applications and devices such as portable scanners. The recent data breach at TJX Companies is a prime example of this.

Nevertheless there is a new twist this time with the attack venue being the wireless client not the network’s controlling AP. This affords the attacker many more opportunities, since direct network intervention is not required. According to this October 17, 2007 article in Yahoo News, Ramachandran’s technique called Cafe Latte consists of the following steps.

1. First, a Cafe Latte loaded notebook begins advertising for other Wi-Fi notebooks in the area and attempts to determine if a responding notebook has ever attached to a WEP encrypted Wi-Fi network.
2. If so the attacking notebook then tries to resolve the SSID of that network and the WEP keystream.
3. Next, using ARP requests in a unique way, the attacking notebook can determine the IP address by the eventual response from the attacked computer when an ARP request with the correct IP address is sent.
4. Knowing the IP address, the attacking notebook will then send out a flood of ARP queries for that IP address. The computer being attacked is required by ARP to respond to the requests, allowing the attacker to eventually get enough “interesting IV’s” to determine the WEP key.
5. The attacker then can either sniff traffic from computers attached to the WEP encrypted network or attempt to gain access to the network directly.

Jon Ellch a well known Wi-Fi security expert-author of Hacking Exposed Wireless-made some interesting comments in the article that I agree with. I also feel that this attack venue is not a casual one. It takes considerable upfront research, such as determining if the network under scrutiny is indeed using WEP. Another complicated step is locating an individual with an attackable computer in a setting where Cafe Latte can do its thing. Still, if the target is lucrative enough, this attack may just be the approach that works. Which I why I reiterate the importance of turning wireless network adapters off when they’re not being used, especially now since there’s more at stake than just the individual computers.

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Pop-up windows: Know the difference between the good, the bad, and the annoying

There's been a lot of publicity about pop-up windows, and most of it hasn't exactly been rave reviews. But it hasn't always been this way.

In fact, pop-up windows were a positive component in the beginning. Created long before tabbed browsers, their purpose was to present information without interfering with the current browser window.

These days, due to security risks as well as the annoyance factor, a standard feature among browsers is to block or control pop-up behavior. But before you start telling your browser or other privacy programs to block all those pop-ups, you need to understand why they happen and what you should really be doing about them.

Most pop-ups are part of the content from the Web site the user is visiting, containing either requested information or info the site thinks one might like. But other pop-ups are just spam that's both invasive and malicious in nature.

These types of pop-ups are actually an alarm telling you that something's wrong with your computer and you need to fix it. Let's divide pop-ups into two general categories—normal and alarms.


Normal pop-ups

Some pop-ups are information you've requested—music or video content from a link you just clicked or a download you requested (hopefully from a trusted site). Web-access e-mail programs use pop-ups to create or reply to e-mail, which mimics a traditional e-mail client.

In addition, some pop-ups are targeted advertising marketed specifically to consumers visiting a Web site. If you find yourself getting too many of these advertisements, it's probably due to the sites you're visiting.

In general, all of these types of pop-ups are the kind you want. And if not, you can easily dismiss them with a click on the X. These are the pop-ups you should be controlling with your browser or privacy program. But the other types of pop-ups are the ones you want to see—because they're alerting you that something's wrong with your system.

Alarm pop-ups

You don't want to block the pop-ups that indicate a problem with your system—these are the ones you want to see and take action on to resolve. For example, if pop-ups are launching through the Windows Messenger Service, you've got a potentially serious problem.

To get rid of these pop-ups, you need to turn off the Messenger Service. Follow these steps:

1. Go to Start | Run, type services.msc, and click OK to launch the Services applet.
2. Scroll down to find Messenger.
3. Right-click Messenger, and select Properties.
4. On the General tab, select Disabled from the Startup Type drop-down list, and click OK.

This is a serious security issue. While the Messenger Service pop-up starts with data on UDP 135, this pop-up indicates that the Windows networking ports (i.e., TCP/UDP 135, 137 through 139, and 445) are open to the public. This pop-up is an alarm that you need to block these ports with your firewall.

Another type of alarm pop-up is the browser flood. As soon as your browser opens, you start receiving a swarm of pop-ups. This browser "spam" is telling you that spyware/adware is running on your system. While this is usually why people enable pop-up blockers, that's comparable to rolling down your window and sticking your head outside so you can see to drive.

What's the real solution? Clean your Windows! Blocking the alarm doesn't solve the problem. If your system has experienced this type of behavior, start shopping for a spyware/adware removal tool (maybe several), and clean your system.

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