David G. Nagel wrote:
Tom Ring wrote:

Allodoxaphobia wrote:

Firefox Firefox Firefox Firefox Firefox Firefox Firefox Firefox
Firefox :-)

The other recommendation, of course is _linux_ ! I've been nearly 100%
on linux here since migrating away from OS/2 over a year ago. I went
to OS/2 back in 1992 after getting hit with the "Stoned" PC virus --
the olde,
floppy disk boot sector style -- on Windows 3.1.
I've never looked back, and never regreted it.

Oh, yes -- almost forgot : Firefox!

gl
Jonesy



I agree with Jonesy to a great extent. I am the security guy, amongst
other things, at our ISP, so here's my short list on how to keep your
PC _YOUR_ PC

1 Don't run a Microsoft OS

2 Don't run a Microsoft OS.

3 If you must run Windows, don't use IE or Outlook (or Express), no
exceptions. Eevr. The suggestion on permanently blocking IE with the
firewall sounds good, I hadn't heard of that one, but I still wouldn't
use IE on anything but a machine with no network connection.

4 See rule #3.

5 No really, reread rule #3. I'm very serious here.

6 If you insist on using Windows use Mozilla, Firefox, Lynx, Opera, or
any of the other freeware or open source browsers. For mail use
Eudora, already mentioned, or Pegasus, my favotite. I have no
knowledge of Agent, so I can't comment.

7 Install a decent antivirus suite, such as McAfee, Norton, Dr
Solomon, etc.

8 Install an anti spyware, such as SpyBot etc.

9 Or just don't run a Microsoft OS


All in all, the group is very much right on point on this subject.

tom
K0TAR

Don't forget that Internet Explorer is hard coded into Windows XP and is
active at all times.

Dave WD9BDZ

Yes, IE is coded in, but that's because it is integral with the file
browsers. I'm running XP Pro.

90% of the time I use Netscape 7.2, which is a step up from 7.1. It
has a nice junk mail filter and popup blocker built in. With the browser
you can have multiple web sites opened up with only one instance of the
browser. The mail and newsgroup section can manage multiple mail servers
and news servers. Some of the buttons seem to have gone away, but I found
them again as configuration items.

But, where IE is really useful is running it in the FTP mode. I can connect
to my web site with a single command and use click and drag to move anything
I want to. An incredibly handy little thing. This works with anonymous ftp
sites as well. I haven't found Netscape to be interactive with the file
browsers.

My mail servers are all spam and virus filtered, so not much gets past
them. Netscape then takes care of the rest.

I also use Netscape 7.1 on Unix. It works great on my Ultra-450 running
Solaris 8. I have IE on there, but the newest version supported is only
5.1, I think. I run 6.2 here. It works, but not real well. It's a pretty
hooky setup.

McAfee runs on both Unix systems and PCs and works very well. You do
have to keep up with it. I get a dat file update about once a week.
Daily some times, when the hackers are real active. My Unix install
scans 20 servers and about 10 TBytes of data in a weeks time. It is
not common to find a virus lurking around but when there is one, it
finds it. Of course, the only ones it finds are Linux viruses. For this,
and many other reasons, I wouldn't recommend Linux to anyone.

But, in the end, I don't have many complaints about XP and IE. I wish
IE had a popup blocker like Netscape. The popups do get through, but
I have never had a problem with throwing them away as soon as they
pop up. I do highly recommend Netscape. I have found that it renders
everything very closely to IE and FireFox. Some minor differences but
nothing great.

--
Martin E. Meserve - K7MEM
http://www.k7mem.com