Protecting Windows

[James Gray]

On Thu, 9 Feb 2006 15:02, Brian Astill wrote:

> So .. what can be done?  Would a good firewall (FBSD?), then distro of
> choice (Ubuntu) and run 2000 in a virtual machine from Linux, protect
> our visually impaired operator from inadvertently triggering a
> virus/trojan/worm embedded in an innocent email or text-based
> web-page or VB-embedded-script in a MSOffice document?
>
> What arrangement would you suggest to enclose Windows in a "safe"
> environment?

Stick a *nix-based firewall and mail server in front of the Windows box.  
The mail server only has to be really simple; fetchnews to get the person's 
existing mail and feed it into the *nix mail filter (www.mailscanner.info 
is hard to pass up for an all-in-one solution).  Then the windows user 
simply sends/receives mail to/from the *nix box and the the *nix box 
sanitises the mail and network traffic (via a firewall; ipf or iptables).

Or you could just install a good virus checker on the Windows box, keep it 
updated and use a half-decent firewall (ZoneAlarm or XP's own firewall are 
sufficient) to achieve the same result.

Linux and FreeBSD are great tools...but if all you have is a hammer, then 
everything looks like a nail doesn't it?  Just coz you can hammer in a 
screw, doesn't make it the right tool for the job.

As other's have pointed out Ubuntu has its own accessibility team who may be 
working on similar tools.  I know KDE can already "read" text from the 
screen (basically any application)...no input though.

Cheers,

James
-- 
Mais assanhada que solteirona em festa de casamento.
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