ASSIGMENT 7: PRIVACY

• CAN PRIVACY BE PROTECTED?
  
  Privacy can be protected by:
  (a) Privacy law
  The privacy laws in Malaysia emphasizes on the following:
  • Security Services to review the security policy
  • Security Management to protect the resources
  • Security Mechanism to implement the required security services
  • Security Objects, the important entities within the system environment
  
  (b) Utilities software
  Example: anti-spam program, firewall, anti-spyware and antivirus.

What is a firewall?

A firewall is a guard between you and the internet, this can be either a software or hardware firewall. It regulates access of program between you and the internet. Firewall protection is very useful and very necessary for users who are always connected to the internet. Firewalls work in the background controlling inbound and outbound traffic and notifies the user of any intrusion attempts on their system. In addition to a good firewall you should also install a good virus scanner and keep it up to date with the latest virus information. A virus scanner with a firewall will reduce your risk of being hacked or virused and help keep both you and your system secure.

Why do you need a firewall?

Whenever your computer is connected to the internet regardless of whether your browser is opened your computer is vulnerable to attack by hackers, worms, trojans, spyware and so on. For those who are utilizing a DSL, Cable Modem, LAN or T1 connection you are open to threats every time you turn your computer on and until your computer is turned off, you have a permanent connection to the internet. It is very simple for just about anybody to come through your internet connection and access your computer.Many PC users believe that no one would bother breaking into their anonymous home computer. Unfortunately, this is not true. Every computer on the Internet has its own IP address, a unique string of numbers that serve as a type of identification. Hackers often program their computers to scan random IP addresses and attack whenever a vulnerable machine is found. They don't need to know your machine personally to attack it. At that point they can perform many malicious acts or steal all of your private information. There are hundreds of ways this can be accomplished.

What do firewalls protect you from?

There are many routes that hackers can take advantage of to gain access to unprotected systems. An effective personal firewall is designed to secure your computer against various threats from the internet or your connected network, including:

Port intrusionsHackers are scanning for vulnerable computers to steal data, corrupt data, destroy or to make use of in the future.

Remote LoginThis is when somebody can log into your computer to access files to actually running programs on your computer.

Application BackdoorsSome programs contain ways to access your programs remotely. Others have bugs in the program that open backdoors, or hidden access that can allow remote access to these programs.

SMTP Session Hijacking - SMTP(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol)This is the most popular way of transferring email over the internet. Hackers often gain access to peoples email address. A person can send unsolicited junk email(spam) to thousands of people using a person's host without them even being aware of this and it makes it very difficult to trace the origin of the emails.

Operating System BugsLike applications, some Operation Systems have backdoors, which can allow hackers to gain access to them.

Denial of Service (DDOS)This type of attack is very hard to control. What a hacker does is send a msg to the victim's computer to make a connection, but when the answer is responded to the computer is unable to find the system. By causing a server to try to respond to these unanswered requests it will cause the system to slow down or eventually crash.

Email BombsThese attacks are mostly personal attacks. Somebody sends you hundreds of the same email filling up you email account until you cannot accept any more emails.

MacrosMany applications allow you to make commands to help you control specific software more easily. Hackers take advantage of this by creating their own macros that will corrupt data or crash your computer.

Viruses and wormsProbably the most well known and still one of the largest threats to computers is a virus. A virus is a small program that will copy onto your system then copy from system to system very quickly. Virus or worms slip in through email attachments and links, weblinks and network or file transfers. These codes can do anything with your computer eg. destroy, corrupt or modify data, render your harddisk and even your operating system useless and then go on to copy itself into other connected systems ( via the internet or your LAN )
Trojans or spywaresAfter slipping in, they install themselves to collect data ( like visited websites, key presses, email messages, passwords and user names ) and transmits the data back to its command server.

SpamSpam is typically harmless junkmail. Unfortunately some junk mail can be very dangerous if you click on one of the links provided. If click on one of these links you can accidentally accept a cookie that will open a backdoor to your computer.