Hi guys, I just got a new computer recently, and got hit with a major virus within 10 minutes of connecting it to the internet for the first time. I registered Norton Antivirus, and it took me a while to get my system totally clean after that (with Ad-aware too and the like...).

Anyway, my Norton Firewall is detecting over 200-300 attacks a day. Is this normal? I keep tracing these attacks, and they come from many different places (Houston, Montreal, Toronto, London Ont., etc...) I've already reported one very frequent attacker to sympatico abuse, but there are too many, and I don't have the time to report them all.

The attacks are so frequent that anytime I'm connected to the internet, every few minutes, it's likely there will be an attack. It sucks because some MP games (Aliens vs. Predator 2, Halo demo, UT2004 demo) will freeze up on me just trying to play them if I have my firewall on, and I'm afraid to turn it off to play them due to the massive volume of attacks.

It just angers me that these nerds have nothing better to do than attack people's computers for the sake of their own demented pleasure.

[This message has been edited by Agent-Smith (edited April 18, 2004).]

Yeah the world sucks...

[edit] Yeah I take my pills in the morning and I'm generally okay but sometimes you just have to be patient with me... brain farts you know.

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Don't be unwise judge me not by my size. You wont believe your eyes watch the xwing rise!

[This message has been edited by MechWarrior (edited April 18, 2004).]

No, that was Agent_Smith.

no, it was not me! I can assure you of that!

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The top ten times in history when using the "F" word
was appropriate.....
10) "What the *&%# was that?" -Mayor of Hiroshima - August 1945
9) "Where did all these *&%#ing Indians come from?" - Custer 1877
8) "Any *&%#ing idiot could understand that." - Einstein 1938
7) "It does SO *&%#ing look like her!" - Picasso 1926
6) "How the *&%# did you work that out?" - Pythagoras 126 BC
5) "You want WHAT on the *&%#ing ceiling?" - Michelangelo 1566
4) "I don't suppose it's gonna *&%#ing rain." - Joan of Arc 1434
3) "Scattered *&%#ing showers...my a$$!" - Noah 2114 BC
2) "I need this parade like I need a *&%#ing hole in my head!" -
JFK 1963
1) "Aw c'mon, who the *&%# is going to find out?" - Bill Clinton 1997

Well the names are so diffrent it was almost stupid of me to make that mistake. Sorry bout that.

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Don't be unwise judge me not by my size. You wont believe your eyes watch the xwing rise!

but is it normal to get that many attacks per day?

And what do I do about those games that won't let me play cause of the firewall? What do some of you do to remedy this?

dont disable your firewall, thats bad. you are probably seeing so many different places pop up because the person is using a fake IP. that happened at work once. it got really bad, so we formatted and reinstalled everything. after that things were fine. it seems he installed a backdoor that was banished during the format. if nothing else, i suggest you try formatting and reinstalling windows (i assume your new comp came with windows). if you dont know how to do that, people in the technology forum will be glad to help you out with it.

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Commerical software firewalls dramatize their limited usefulness through an extrodinarily loose definition of "attack". A script kiddie scanning an IP range for vulnerable services is not a danger, assuming you patch and backup often. I would ditch the software.

I've never used a firewall.

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[="Mothers stop cooking take off your aprons; Fathers stop looking at every sports station; Take a second, and think of every poor nation." - Nas=]

Massassian since: March 12, 2001

a GOOD firewall is worth more than just about anything else. a crappy firewall isnt worth much, but still better than nothing. when getting security software, you really DO get what you pay for.

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What are the aeverities of the attacks? A good number of them could just be accidental; any junk like pings or probes or web scripts. Norton should indicate the severity of the attack.

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Bassoon, n. A brazen instrument into which a fool blows out his brains.

Get a good hardware firewall.

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1 of 14 | 6-16 Never Forget. | Click.

the attacks for today are now numbering at 479! I cannot stand this! is this a random person? I have no idea of anyone who would want or need to hack my computer. I'm getting warnings about someone trying to execute a Trojan Horse on my system like 5 times today alone.

format, then get a GOOD firewall, preferably hardware. it's more expensive, but well worth it.

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I wouldn't say that. A cheap 486 with a couple network cards can be infinitely more effective than any software solution. Cost is rarely an conclusive indicator of quality when you're dealing with things that aren't physical.

[This message has been edited by Ictus (edited April 18, 2004).]

well, expensive, my router has a built in hardware firewall and cost me around 120$CAD.



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* Seb goes around singing "I'm too sexy for my body"
* Wolfy goes around singing "I'm too sexy for Seb's body"
* Cave_Demon steals Seb's underwear (underwear stolen: 39)

Before I go looking into a hardware firewall, tell me, does it interfere with online games like BF 1942 and the ones I mentioned above? Because right now Norton's does.

oh, and now it's at 600 attacks today. Just great...

Is it really necessary that I format? I spent hours just getting my old files onto here, it would really suck if I had to do that all over again. As well, I have not even the slightest clue how to format the computer, and to be honest, I'm afraid to do it and screw up my new computer even more... Does anyone think someone has a backdoor or whatever installed in my system that makes mine a big target for these attacks?



[This message has been edited by Agent-Smith (edited April 18, 2004).]

if you do decide to format (i would, but i like doing it), just go to the technology forum. you should get a lot of help there. if you're running Win XP, its pretty simple really and i could walk you through it pretty easily.

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Er, did you read our posts? Can you find any information reguarding the severity or other sepcifics of these attacks? As stated, many commercial firewalls, Norton included, will find and stop critical attacks, but will glorify small attacks to make you think it's a really awesome product that you REALLY needed. Most all of them you should be able to ignore, anything remotely severe you can probably block perminantly.

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Bassoon, n. A brazen instrument into which a fool blows out his brains.

firewalls are for girls

If you want a good firewall, you really want a hardware one.

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"His Will Was Set, And Only Death Would Break It"

"None knows what the new day shall bring him"

buck is right, software firewalls cannot do the same job as a good hardware one. go to www.hackfix.org and see if you can find any info that will help you.

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Software firewalls are hardly useless. Infact, the firewalls that come on most affordable routers are probably worse. I know my NETGEAR router has basically two firewall options: on and off. A properly configured software firewall, provided that it is a good enough firewall (like a good Linux firewall, e.g. a Linux box nothing but routing) can be just as good, although significantly slower for larger networks. Routers are designed to do nothing but route, so they do it far more effectively than a PC. But not like it matters for a small home network.

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Bassoon, n. A brazen instrument into which a fool blows out his brains.

Norton is constantly telling me it's matching Trojan Horses and the like.

Once it was doing it every few minutes, and it turned out it was roadrunner sending me relays to check my connection. A card had been damaged by a surge following that northeast blackout (I was sure I unplugged it too), so it didn't recognize it and kept blocking it for 30 minute intervals, and roadrunner kept dropping my connection as a result.

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Steal my dreams and sell them back to me.....

If i've been hosting a game of JA or something, for the next hour or so norton will go wild telling me there are 'attacks'.. it's simply people trying to connect to the game which is no longer there. Norton sucks for that but I keep it runing for safe measure.

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WARNING: THIS POST MAY CONTAIN TRACES OF PEANUT!!!
----@%

www.agnitum.com

I love it. Love it to death.
Its great for outgoing, not sure about incoming.

Also, I use a hardware firewall on my network, namely a Netgear FR114P router. It's a real pain at times, but it does its job, which is to provide us all with internet access and stop incoming traffic (it does that extremely well trust me...bloody firewall)

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Founder of the Massassi Brute Squad (MBS)

B'tduz: A popular dwarfish game which consists of standing a few feet apart and throwing large rocks at one another's head.

"Yes, it's a bloody flying alligator setting fire to my city!" - His Grace His Excellency the Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes.

Morituri Nolumus Mori

Don't feel so bad. When we first got out new PC, Windows XP along with a TOTALLY new PC that my dad built, he installed Zone Alarm Pro, and as soon as we got online, we got like 50 hackers. Next day, 100. Next next day, 200, etc. Finally, I think they gave up like after a week. By the time it was over we had like 500 attacks daily. But, thank god for the FW. I'm NEVER turning it off again! *hugs Zone Alarm Pro*

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Titan A.E.

"The least they could do is kill my food before I eat it." - Cale

Although my name represents one of my favorite songs, in a way it also explains my actual person, a Cosmic Castaway!

Zone Alarm can seriously fudge up systems. As a matter of fact, any software firewalls can. I've seen people have to reformat due to crappy firewall programs, simply because the things wouldn't restore the internet after being uninstalled.

And you would not believe how many incoming packets come to your PC. Doesn't mean someone is hacking you. HECK, if you close your browser in the middle of loading a webpage, you'll get blocked packets from the webserver that is trying to find out if you are still maintaining a connection with it. It's not that hard to collect over 200 in one single day, and not have one single hack attempt. In general terms, if you don't have something on your PC worth getting, and you're just the average home user, as in, not hosting lots of games and websites and such, then you will probably never be touched. Think of it this way: Why would a robber break into a car with nothing valuable in it? Simple, he wouldn't. He'd move on to something that he could sell. Unless your PC has the plans to the deathstar or something, it is HIGHLY unlikely anyone is trying to do anything to your PC.

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ZoneAlarm is one such firewall that over-glorifies "attacks."
In the last 20 hours, ZoneAlarm has blocked 1176 "access attempts." A lot of them are from my own ISP. But looking at my log, it does block some funny ones...

devnull.some****ingdomain.com made an access attempt 6 minutes ago.

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«»The Scratchware Manifesto
-¬thoughts from beyond observance

yeah, norton screwed up my brand new comp. had to format and reinstall to get online.

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