Security Suite for P2P?

What do these security packages do to protect P2P downloading? Like are there that can hide your IP, or other information etc...?

(P2P doesn't automatically mean that it's illegal, it's only when the content is copy protected)

 

Do a Google search on Peer Guardian (also available on places like download.com)

 

Actually the law differs in every country.

 

Yes this is accurate, but in the case of Microsoft there is a Grey line.

It seems that Microsoft 'tacitly' allows otherwise "illegal" downloads that are defeated by their updates. Why would they do this, you may question?

The obvious answer is they want you to try out their products in the belief that you will want to go legit and eventually buy their products.

Not an unreasonable assumption as most people do not want "illegal" software on their computer for an extended period of time.

Bill Gates was a 'pirate' himself in his early days and is 48 billion dollars richer by going "legit" (read , he has a hell of a lot of lawyers now).

He knows the ropes of walking the fine line of the razor, and uses it to his advantage.

To protect yourself in P2P downloads use 'SandboxIE' or 'Returnil' while testing and you will be adequately protected (along with malware scanning before committing the downloads to your proper hard drive or proper partition).

Using 'SandboxIE' and 'Returnil' simultaneously is dam near foolproof in downloading P2P stuff.

 

Peer Guardian is a kind of IP firewall that protects your P2P from "fake servers", known bad IP's, and corporations checking "illegal content download".
Also is usefull for protect daily current browsing from spyware, ads, etc.
It's configurable with downloadable lists from Bluetack, and also for user customizable lists of IP's (allowed/blocked).
Can be used than another component of your security system.

 

If you believe that blocking a huge number of ips will protect you during p2p sessions from the companies that patrol for illegal content sharing and copyright infridgements then you are wrong.

There have been huge discussions about it. Peerguardian and other software that use a list to block ips can help but not at a % that can make you feel secure.

Note: A lot of users report problems of peerguardian with vista. Best solution would be to avoid peerguardian if your p2p client has an internal blocking ip feature. If it does load the list of ips you want to block in the client.

About the malware protection...I believe a sandbox application that supports and can handle well the p2p client that you use is a must.

 

Actually the most used method the anti-p2p organizations caught you is being member of the swarm you are currently downloading. These anti-p2p peers then look up every IP that is downloading that file. Then you will receive a letter or a mail after a while to delete the files you have downloaded and also delete your p2p program you use to download with.
The best protection would be to download from better secured swarms.

 

Beside what has been mention here you could use..

P2P Fire
IPFilter.dat

 

Agnitum Outpost has IP blocker & control feature, Rising internet Segurity (available a free vers) has also Blacklist & withelist for IP's, PeerGuardian is a more configurable tool but discontinued "official" developement. For me is another security layer.

When I've used P2P clients to download something (here in Spain, "today", download any kind of file disposable for personal pourpouses is legal, not for massive share or commercial), PeerGuardian helped me a lot blocking a lot of undesired connections attempts from "patrol" companies and "fake servers".
Never I've got advertisements, and the most of times download something of my interest was easy, without connection interruptions, attacks (yes, some "companies" do attacks), or fake files download.

In Spain, everybody pay a "canon" (special tass for the SGAE, Sociedad General de Autores de España) when buy a writable support (CD's, DVD's), an usb memory stick, a hard disk, etc.

Generally, when something connects to a web page, another simultaneous connections successed, but....all desired? With PeerGuardian you can take a little bit control of this and block the known indesired, ads, spy...ones, always with all by the user control.

I'm using Windows XP, I know some problems with Vista and another security software also.

Avast! (the free version also) has built in a P2P shield.