Windows Vista Vista ... and Security

muckshifter

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Always a sore point and a thorn in Microsoft's side and they have put a lot of effort into protecting Vista, not only from the outside world, but also from ourselves ...

UAC, User Account Control, has had a lot of bad press, and from a lot of high profile people, shame they also recommend turning it off ... I do not recommend you follow that advice ... I would like to see and addition to it, Passwords ... yep, you should also need to use a password. No, I ain't "lost it" I am very serious ... :nod:

The "implementation" of UAC is a step in the right direction for better security & protection from outside interference, I'm a firm believer in it, and not just me, Linux & MAC users have had the same "protection" for some years, and you will need to give a password too. However, because Linux & MACs have had this "security" built-in since day-one, program writers have had to write their programs with this security in mind. Because of this, Linux & MAC users are not inundated with unneeded requests to allow a program to run ... a quick word here, Vista has made great improvements in the amount of UAC pop-ups you will see since the annoying days of the Beta testing, sad to say that this was the cause of a lot of people posting "fixes" on how to turn off UAC.

The simple answer is to get Line-of-Business (LOB, don't you just love acronyms) applications to run in Windows Vista, correctly ... Because UAC makes a clear distinction between administrator and standard user processes, some existing LOB applications might/should/could need to be either redesigned by the software vendor, or marked to always run elevated. I do hope they at least try, or I, for one, may go looking around for an alternative program that, in my eyes, is genially Vista ready. :thumb:

An example ...
Antivirus vendors were up in arms over Microsoft's new security measures, well, some of them were, two of the "market leaders" were somewhat peeved at MS over their reluctance to divulge the inner workings of Vista ... others, on the other hand, just got on with the job and produced good working programs that, incidentally, do NOT require you to "click continue" because of UAC ... they just work. ;)

Can I also add here ... there is NO known Virus for Vista at the present time ... no doubt that will be change by some ID 10 T who thinks him/herself clever. Oh, before you go and tell me that one was shown in the first 3 days of Vista Beta, may I suggest you read a little more on that, you'll find a lot of misinformation on that one, and from a respected AV vendor too, then others jump on the same "bad-waggon" ... tut tut. :rolleyes:

OK, having said that there are no Viruses for Vista, doesn't mean you should not bother installing some sort of additional security measures ... I insist on it, so do Microsoft.

Now to the point of my post ... :D

Vista has a slightly improved Firewall, it now monitors inbound & outbound traffic to your PC. Unfortunately, ALL outbound traffic is allowed by default and unless you are some sort of expert in Firewall rules and how to implement them, you will be better off getting something that is easier for the "lay-person" to use ... that includes me. ;)

There are quite a few Software Firewalls out there, some are "Vista Ready", and, unless you are behind a NAT Router, I highly recommend looking for an alternative to Vista's own incarnation. I cannot recommend some of the more well known Firewalls, and yes, I have had the "pleasure" of "testing" my pet hates, I'm not alone in my assessments of these "so-called" market leaders. I'll let you decide, but please, get to know how the one you do choose actually works ... you'll be better equipped to at least try and fix any problems that may occur. :p

I have had an early birthday present, very early ... thank you Ian. :thumb:

I have installed Kaspersky Internet Security
(KIS ... reminds me of another acronym, KISS ... Keep It Simple Stupid)

I have to say straight off that I initially had a "problem" with the install ... my PC all but froze ... no idea if it was a Vista, install or a KIS related problem, or not ... all I can tell you is I had to use the PCs re-set button ... yep, I was not amused. :mad: I'll chalk it up to, it's a PC, crap happens. :rolleyes:

OK, after the obligatory ... your PC was not shutdown correctly screen, it rebooted back up and a second attempt to install KIS went without a hitch. relief. :)

There are a few screens to navigate, not many, and one informing you that KIS will turn off Vista's firewall, I must add, you do get a prompt from UAC :p After that it prompts you straight away that the Virus Definitions are not up-to-date and you haven't conducted a virus scan ... this is normal, and I would expect any decent AV program to do the same.

Operation's of Vista do not seem to be affected, I have not noticed any "slow-downs" whatsoever ... as far as I can see, simply by using CAD & having a look at all processes, KIS has a very small footprint on resources/memory in use, it is pretty damn impressive in my book ... another little note here, Vista does handle your memory in a different way than XP, so I used the comparison as a guide. Diskeeper, monitoring in the background via "set-it-&-forget-it, is actually using more memory than KIS. :D

KIS is an All-in-One "solution" and the program provides protection against viruses, spam attacks, hacker attacks, unknown threats, phishing and rootkits. I'm not going to go into every aspect of KIS, if you want to know more, visit KAV's website or download the KIS Users Guide and have a read for yourself.

I have had to "teach" KIS, that, all bar one email was safe to download and have, temporarily, turned that off, so I can see how Outlook Express err, sorry Vista Mail, handles any future suspect email ... Vista Mail did pick one out of the crowd prior to installing KIS, and marked as Junk Mail and, unceremoniously dumped it into the Junk Mail folder. Still "testing" the worth of Vista Mail over Thunderbird, so far I like it. :thumb:

Enjoy!

:user:

Constructive responses most welcome. :)
 

Ian

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I've been using Ubuntu at work as some of the software I need only works on Linux, and that requires a password every time just like you want from UAC. I agree that it is a good thing for the vast majority of people, and will hopefully bring up the overall security level of the general computing populous :) I've not tried Vista final yet, so I've got a few weeks to wait before I can comment on what I think of it personally ;)

I'm also very pleased about your thoughts on Vista with KIS, as some AV solutions I've tried have really slowed down my PC (McAfee at Uni, I have no choice in the matter :eek: ). I'm looking forward to Vista a lot more than I was after reading your posts :)
 

muckshifter

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Well thank you Boss, only too pleased to at least give you some thoughts about my new burpday prezzie, KIS. :D


I'm also happy to pass on my personal experience with Vista ... unlike my experience with the Beta version, which was very stable, but had some very laughable habits that MS have "gone all out" to at least minimize any adverse affect to the user.

I think I can safely say ... our regular members here at PCR know me by now, and know I write it how I see it ... I may not be right, hell I've been wrong loads of times ... but Vista is "fun" and stable ... loads more to it than meets the eye.

Loads more to come ... gonna try DVD's next. ;)
 

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