Web Log of Aleksey Nudelman: Thoughts on Software Architecture

Analysis and Review of Microsoft Technologies for IT Managers, Architects and Developers

Thursday, January 6th

Microsoft released an anti- spyware tool


History:
Back in 2003, Microsoft purchased GeCad, a Romanian anti-virus maker. There were lots of speculations whether Microsoft was going to enter an Anti-Virus market. However, GeCad, a well known maker of Anti-Virus product for Linux, did not have a well known anti-virus for Windows. In 2004 Microsoft bundled XP SP2 with a firewall which it developed in collaboration with McAfee. In December 2004, Microsoft purchased an anti-software maker Giant Company Software (giantcompany.com). It is obvious that Microsoft Anti-Spyware is, apart from slight re-branding, an identical product to Giant Anti Spyware (TM).
Experience:
Microsoft Anti-Spyware runs great, spyware detection is good and the user interface is pleasant.
If you download "free" programs from the Internet, you probably have a few spyware programs residing on your computer.
Recommendation:
I recommend that you download and run Microsoft Anti-Spyware.

aleksey on 01.06.05 @ 02:04 PM PST [link]


Monday, January 3rd

Session hijacking


When computers need to talk to each other, they simply do so. But, how do you know that your computer is really talking to the computer it thinks it's talking to?

How do you know that an attacker has not taken over the session between the computers and is passively monitoring the conversation, or even changing it? You would certainly know it—belatedly—if the order for 1,000 widgets that you sent to a business partner was received as an order for 100,000 widgets. This can happen, courtesy of a well-timed strike by an intruder.

Right now, you might be asking:

"How does this work?"
"Is my network susceptible to this?"
"What can I do to prevent this from happening?"

Session hijacking works by taking advantage of the fact that most communications are protected (by providing credentials) at session setup, but not thereafter. These attacks generally fall into three categories: Man-in-the-middle (MITM), Blind Hijack, and Session Theft.
Article


aleksey on 01.03.05 @ 10:33 AM PST [link]



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