I’m sure you’re much more knowledgable about computers than I will ever hope to be, Anthracite, but when I tried to install a personal firewall on my computer, and everything went to hell and froze, BellSouth ADSL support told me never to try to download a firewall on their system, because it was already protected and anything added on top of that would put my computer “at odds” with their service.
Now, I know one has to take what they say with a grain of salt, but I took them at their word at the time. Hence my comment.
The best advice you’ve gotten so far is to have someone check out the system when it’s off the net. I’ve been working in computers and thier advances for more than 10 years. In this time, especially since the advent of the Internet, I’ve never seen an end user’s machine that was actually hacked.
I HAVE seen people download and install fun things like Back Orifice, tomaweb, and any number of remote control softwares disguised as something else.
I once had a lady convinced that she had been hacked. Had gone so far as to change her phone #, and was in the process of moving to a new house to “get away” from the hacker. The “hacker” was using her phone to make long distance calls to Austrailia, she said, and putting porn on her computer. Turns out her husband downloaded one of those porn dial-up programs and was picking up his porn using 10-10-321 from a dial up service in Melbourne.
Always check close to home first, then start worrying about the hacker.
Thanks a lot for the help, everyone who’s posted here. I’m pretty sure now that it’s not a hacker, although I can’t figure out what exactly it is/was. I’m the only person to use my computer (not counting the occasional other person playing Freecell), and I haven’t downloaded any dodgy programs (and if I have, they should be picked up by Norton).
I’d also like to apologise to anyone I p**sed off with my tone earlier on - I was posting from a combination of sleep deprivation and panic, and I didn’t mean to sound like I was unappreciative of what anyone was saying.
I understand and appreciate your dilemna. However, the problem is that SW Bell, in general, not only has the worst technical support, but nearly an open contempt for its customers. They tell me the same thing, and yet my 1 GB http logs show that my servers are completely unprotected by them. I have to apply my own hardware, software, and legal protection to protect my property. But yes, SW Bell will also tell me the same exact thing as they told you.
When I subscribed to ADSL from my ISP, I was surprised when I was told that I would be protected from viruses. Huh? I said I didn’t want that. What I’m buying is a connection to the Internet. Packets coming from my machine should be passed on to the Internet. Packets coming from the Internet addressed to my machine should be passed to my machine. If they did anything to interfere with that I’d be sorely disappointed and have to find someone else to provide my service. The lady I was talking to was quite surprised. Why wouldn’t I want to be protected from viruses? I tried to explain that it was for the same reason that I didn’t want them listening to my phone calls in order to protect me from obscene phone calls. Could she explain precisely what filtering they were doing. No she couldn’t. Could I speak to someone with technical knowledge Yes I could. She connects me to the techinal guy. He tells me of course they don’t filter. All they do is pass my packets to the Internet, and pass packets from the Internet to my machine. Period. Thanks.