I HAD root (at least on the machine I was scanning from =P).
As I recall, I'd elected to use a less stealthy TCP scan because I wanted to be as aboveboard as possible, sorta like the LAN equivalent of yelling "Hey, anyone home?" from the sidewalk as opposed sneaking up and trying the doorknobs with a stealth SYN scan. =P
Well, why not legit? If I scan all of my dorm's IP range (well-documented) on port 80 (the offense that nearly got me in trouble except for knoweldgeable judicial affairs types in the office), there are three possible results for any given IP address.
People who have a webserver on port 80, which is out and open to the public because they had something to say. (unless they password it)
People who have a default web server install with a default page (the most common in those days of (not necessarily legal) Win2k Pro/Server boxes everywhere)
People with nothing running on port 80.
Now, if I was scanning for open BackOrfice or SubSeven ports, or open ssh/telnet servers, then I might be suspect. But in reality, my problem came about because many of the no-server types had BlackICE running, and it decided to interpret nmap's scan (using the politest settings I could) as an "attack".
One packet to each machine on your LAN does not an attack make, and I don't understand why this should be considered not legit.
There's been a marked increase in system administrators thinking that anything even remotely resembling a network scan is eeeeevil (case in point, last year I almost got kick out of college for scanning port 80 on my dorm subnet looking for interesting websites to read)...
What do you think can be done to make scanning IP addresses/ports have less of a negative stigma? This is in the same sort of category as legit vs. illegit uses of anything else (P2P, whatever)--what's the rationale for punishing something that could maybe lead to criminal activity, and how can we make network scanning tools have practical uses again?
Heck, they should compare Win2k3+SMB vs. RedHat(9, not 8)+NFS....Don't win2k and newer workstations have the options for "File Services for Unix" built in there somewhere?
And hell, for backend stuff, a Win2k3 server mounting NFS shares from *nix machines is almost inevitable--hell, it's one of their stronger server-room selling points (interoperates with your current servers!)
Hey, if MY ISP didn't follow what I thought were correct standards, I'd switch in a heartbeat. Hell, if my electric company's power browned out and varied in voltage all the time, I'd switch if it were possible, too. Switching ISPs is a hell of a lot easier than switching electric companies, most places.
Original poster said "I can't do business because my ISP has no (X)". My response was "go someplace that provides (X)". Your response appears to be "Everyone should go out of their way to not need (X) anymore".
I think maybe it might be a better solution overall if ISPs who were dumb about PTR records lost customers.
Incidentally, where I live it's both possible and a fairly good idea to shop around for a new electric company. =P
Doesn't your ISP have PTR records anyway, though? Even if it resolves to something like modem212-yourstate-yrcty.adelphia.com like my cable modem does, it's still a valid PTR record.
If your ISP doesn't do this, might I suggest shopping around for a new one?
I was under the impression the original question referred to completely nonexistent PTR records (that resolve to NXDOMAIN or similar).
If you refuse to accept mail without a valid PTR record, and that lowers your user's spam...
I'd say PTR records are important. I know most systems I set up check that PTR and A/CNAME records match each other as a first step in determining whether the connection is trustworthy or not.
Of course, if everyone did this we might see spammers/crackers setting up technically valid but wholly useless PTR records. At which point, who knows?
That is, I don't think you need to limit government prosecution of CRIMINAL cases, but the matching spending idea for CIVIL suits seems like a hell of a good way to even the playing field for the little guy.
Speaking as a semi-informed source (heh, my great-x5-grand-uncle is the "Sholes" in "Sholes keyboard")...
QWERTY is designed to reduce mechanical sticking in mechanical typewriters. Not by slowing down typists, but by moving commonly letter pairs away from each other. Seriously, I'm just thinkign about this now and I see very (e+r is one) few (and another) instances where you hit adjacent keys consecutively on a Sholes keyboard.
OTOH, touch-typing on this thing is giving my carpal tunnel fits. =p Back to hunt-n-peck...
Technically I suppose I could be modded redundant, but if someone's still posting the old "slowing down typists" legend it can't be THAT redundant. =P
Re:NEWSFLASH, NTFS is a journaling filesystem!
on
Looking at Longhorn
·
· Score: 1
> NTFS WORKS WELL.
...for very small values of well, in my experience.
Even Win2k NTFS, which is very good, doesn't hold a candle to ReiserFS or Ext3...for reasons up to and including the fact that I can get utilities to mount ext3/RFS partitions on Win2k, but not NTFS (well) on Linux.
Sorry, MS, but open formats are preferable.
Re:Silence of the Lambs Construction Kit
on
The Sims 2 Announced
·
· Score: 2, Funny
My girlfriend used to make families entirely named after people she didn't like, with the express purpose of walling them in and starving them to death in effigy.
...maybe THAT'S why the Sims is so popular. Virtual hatred. =P
If they're smart enough to demand virus scanners on every computer in the company, they're still dumber than the managers who respect that the technicians know MUCH more about computers than they do.
My CEO tells me his requirements, I tell him what to buy, 'cause he knows he's not as tech-savvy as I am.
He tells me my budget, and I work with that, because I know he knows more than I do about what our bottom line is.
Any manager with no technical training who overrules his technicians is an idiot. Period.
Slashdot Mirror
I HAD root (at least on the machine I was scanning from =P).
As I recall, I'd elected to use a less stealthy TCP scan because I wanted to be as aboveboard as possible, sorta like the LAN equivalent of yelling "Hey, anyone home?" from the sidewalk as opposed sneaking up and trying the doorknobs with a stealth SYN scan. =P
People who have a webserver on port 80, which is out and open to the public because they had something to say. (unless they password it)
People who have a default web server install with a default page (the most common in those days of (not necessarily legal) Win2k Pro/Server boxes everywhere)
People with nothing running on port 80.
Now, if I was scanning for open BackOrfice or SubSeven ports, or open ssh/telnet servers, then I might be suspect. But in reality, my problem came about because many of the no-server types had BlackICE running, and it decided to interpret nmap's scan (using the politest settings I could) as an "attack".
One packet to each machine on your LAN does not an attack make, and I don't understand why this should be considered not legit.
There's been a marked increase in system administrators thinking that anything even remotely resembling a network scan is eeeeevil (case in point, last year I almost got kick out of college for scanning port 80 on my dorm subnet looking for interesting websites to read)...
What do you think can be done to make scanning IP addresses/ports have less of a negative stigma? This is in the same sort of category as legit vs. illegit uses of anything else (P2P, whatever)--what's the rationale for punishing something that could maybe lead to criminal activity, and how can we make network scanning tools have practical uses again?
Heck, they should compare Win2k3+SMB vs. RedHat(9, not 8)+NFS....Don't win2k and newer workstations have the options for "File Services for Unix" built in there somewhere?
And hell, for backend stuff, a Win2k3 server mounting NFS shares from *nix machines is almost inevitable--hell, it's one of their stronger server-room selling points (interoperates with your current servers!)
I agree entirely, which is why my personal SMTP server authenticates on a per-user basis and you can contact it from anywhere on the net.
I don't understand why more sites don't use this, I just commented that workarounds for the problem you're facing DO exist.
Most e-mail clients I use provide the ability to use multiple sets of e-mail settings...Eudora 5.x (which I use) and IIRC Outlook both do this.
Hey, if MY ISP didn't follow what I thought were correct standards, I'd switch in a heartbeat. Hell, if my electric company's power browned out and varied in voltage all the time, I'd switch if it were possible, too. Switching ISPs is a hell of a lot easier than switching electric companies, most places.
Original poster said "I can't do business because my ISP has no (X)".
My response was "go someplace that provides (X)".
Your response appears to be "Everyone should go out of their way to not need (X) anymore".
I think maybe it might be a better solution overall if ISPs who were dumb about PTR records lost customers.
Incidentally, where I live it's both possible and a fairly good idea to shop around for a new electric company. =P
Doesn't your ISP have PTR records anyway, though? Even if it resolves to something like modem212-yourstate-yrcty.adelphia.com like my cable modem does, it's still a valid PTR record.
If your ISP doesn't do this, might I suggest shopping around for a new one?
I was under the impression the original question referred to completely nonexistent PTR records (that resolve to NXDOMAIN or similar).
If you refuse to accept mail without a valid PTR record, and that lowers your user's spam... I'd say PTR records are important. I know most systems I set up check that PTR and A/CNAME records match each other as a first step in determining whether the connection is trustworthy or not. Of course, if everyone did this we might see spammers/crackers setting up technically valid but wholly useless PTR records. At which point, who knows?
Honestly, I think a little of both works best.
That is, I don't think you need to limit government prosecution of CRIMINAL cases, but the matching spending idea for CIVIL suits seems like a hell of a good way to even the playing field for the little guy.
I can't justify reading the article at work, so I have no idea whether StrongMad will be a playable model in multiplayer. =P
Speaking as a semi-informed source (heh, my great-x5-grand-uncle is the "Sholes" in "Sholes keyboard")...
QWERTY is designed to reduce mechanical sticking in mechanical typewriters. Not by slowing down typists, but by moving commonly letter pairs away from each other. Seriously, I'm just thinkign about this now and I see very (e+r is one) few (and another) instances where you hit adjacent keys consecutively on a Sholes keyboard.
OTOH, touch-typing on this thing is giving my carpal tunnel fits. =p Back to hunt-n-peck...
Technically I suppose I could be modded redundant, but if someone's still posting the old "slowing down typists" legend it can't be THAT redundant. =P
> NTFS WORKS WELL.
...for very small values of well, in my experience.
Even Win2k NTFS, which is very good, doesn't hold a candle to ReiserFS or Ext3...for reasons up to and including the fact that I can get utilities to mount ext3/RFS partitions on Win2k, but not NTFS (well) on Linux.
Sorry, MS, but open formats are preferable.
My girlfriend used to make families entirely named after people she didn't like, with the express purpose of walling them in and starving them to death in effigy.
...maybe THAT'S why the Sims is so popular. Virtual hatred. =P
If they're smart enough to demand virus scanners on every computer in the company, they're still dumber than the managers who respect that the technicians know MUCH more about computers than they do. My CEO tells me his requirements, I tell him what to buy, 'cause he knows he's not as tech-savvy as I am. He tells me my budget, and I work with that, because I know he knows more than I do about what our bottom line is. Any manager with no technical training who overrules his technicians is an idiot. Period.