Strange Activity Since Switching from Cable to DSL

Hello All,

Quick question for you as I am new to DSL. I have noticed a LOT of IP
addresses (that seem to be Verizon's I am using Verizon Online DSL now) being blocked by my router via viewing my logs in Wallwatcher. There is definitely from 4-5 upon startup, and then every few minutes another one or two. They all seem to be going to microsoft-ds port 445 on my local machine or port 137 which I know is for netbios. NOTE: I have File and Printer sharing disabled.

So my question is, is this normal? Or should I just hide these events
from being logged by Wallwatcher? BTW, I have also noticed a lot of IP's that seem to be from China being stopped by my router as well. Crazy huh? I did not notice as much when I had my cable connection. Is this all strange to you or a normal thing not to worry about?

Thanks in advance for any all replies.

Regards,

Jag

Win XP Pro /w SP2
Linksys BEFSX41
NOD32
BOClean
SpywareBlaster
Ad-Aware
MSAS
Spybot S&D
Custom Hosts File
Firefox as main browser

 

Sadly, this should now be considered normal "background" noise and the justification for using a firewall in the first place! There are numerous worms and scanning tools trying to check these ports, spammers trying to trigger Windows Messenger popup adverts on your PC (the most likely cause of the connections from Chinese ISPs, many of whom are notoriously spammer-tolerant) and poorly configured PCs broadcasting their presence on the Internet via NetBIOS.

Your previous ISP was probably just doing a better job of filtering them - given Verizon's CEO's previous customer-friendly statements I think you can expect to have more issues with them.

As an aside, I would advise running a software firewall also (if you are not already) since this allows you to control which applications can send traffic out - which a router firewall cannot. This can help protect your privacy by allowing you to restrict "phone-home" software and act as a last line of defence against malware, much of which needs to make a network connection to send data out.

 

Paranoid2000,

Thanks so much for taking the time to respond to this. I was beginning to think that no one here knew what was going on.

This is pretty sad and I guess yeah, my last ISP must have had things nailed down tighter with regards to security.

I am in the market for a good software firewall that uses lil system resources. I guess I had better pick up the pace with my choice!

Many thanks for your reply.

Best Regards,

Jag