Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Byrons_Ghost" data-source="post: 3402719" data-attributes="member: 7396">It seems to me that programs like AdAware and other spyware detectors should be able to find most things on your computer that would send data back to botnets or other listeners. So, instead of having a firewall in the background to monitor all traffic, you could just get spyware removal tools and run them regularly to make sure that nothing is sending out data.I prefer AdAware, myself. I had the other major one, whose name I can't remember (Spybuster? something like that), but it was updated so seldomly that I decided to switch. That's the downside to this route, if the anti-ad software isn't up to date, then it doesn't know the newest malware to look for. A firewall, OTOH, would be on the constant lookout for proccesses opening ports that they shouldn't.In the past, I've used online port scanning programs (I don't have a URL handy, but you can google about) to check my firewall, and I've found the exact same results from them with a router only as I have with ZoneAlarm + router. I still have ZoneAlarm installed, but with everyone else saying it's a big drain I might just go back to using XP SP2 firewall instead...</blockquote>