Federal interference or a necessary step?

http://apnews.myway.com//article/20040318/D81D2DCO0.html

 

Seeing as the state of the internet concerning security is not all that good now days. A program like this might just possibly help the users that are uniformed about security issues learn a few ways to help keep their computers. secure. Even with all the information avaliable on pc security there are still people that don't run an av or at or even a firewall. Since not all of these people will come to wilders or some other security forum, maybe this program would help some of them.

 

Paste:

**Critics said the industry's proposals failed to adequately blame software companies whose products are insecure.

Alan Paller of the SANS Institute in Bethesda, Md., compared the recommendations to advising motorists to wear football pads and helmets while driving "because the automobile manufacturers won't build in seat belts and air bags and better bumpers."**


Imo, that was the best part of the article.
An each time I read an article like this it appears more obvious that "Powers-That-wouldbe" are striving towards controling internet useage and monitoring thereof.
Not at all a political comment. Nor to I jump at "bumps in the night"....

 

For the record:

Several years ago I turned the computers off and left them off until nine days ago....why... simply because of having accepted the direction the internet is heading in. The only differance between "years ago" and today is that now its being done more openly.

 

An so now the complaints begin:


http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=25140;start=new;boardseen=1


In case the link does noy insert correctly..it leads to the LooknStop forum

 

I am not a proponent of the government getting involved in the internet or personal computing. But to be truthful nothing else seems to be working. If anyone else has an idea how to accomplish getting all users to use even the most basic security solutions.I wish they would bring it forward before we loose the internet as we know it now. I for one would like to keep the net around awhile.

 

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/56/36266.html .

If the ISP's want to help the situation without the government getting the chance to shove rules and regulations down their throats, then the ISP's need to do more things like what's in the above article.

If all ISP's would further check all outbound emails (from their customers at their servers) before forwarding the mail to its' final destination, they could also cut off people's Internet access who were infected and spreading virus', trojans or whatever (or the more un-sophisticated ones, at least) until that person could prove that their computer was clean again.

Can a server be set to monitor whether or not your computer has just decided to start sending multiple, closely-spaced requests to any given individual site? (IOW, your computer's a "zombie" of the type used in DDos attacks against someone).

If so, "WHACK!" - there goes your net connection until you can either provide a good explanation, or get your computer back into shape.

Yeah, yeah, I already know everyone's going to tell me that this sort of thing can't be done - but it seems to me that the solution lies more with the ISP's themselves (and how they handle traffic) - and with the people who provide server software (to give the ISP's the enhanced abilities they need to cope with all this stuff).

Everyone needs to start thinking outside of the box and finding out how it can be done rather than saying that it can't.

Heavy-handed? Un-sympathetic?

You bet.

If someone's too lazy or too stupid to learn how to protect their own computer (and thus everyone else's) - then they don't belong on the Internet anyway. Pete

*Another article along the same lines:

http://news.com.com/2100-1038-5174061.html