This month, I'm
going to discuss the security ramifications associated with popular
file sharing programs such as Napster, Gnutella, Audio Galaxy, Imesh...
and many others that are cropping up recently.
These types of
programs allow the user to download songs, files, movie files, etc.,
to their hard drive from a wide variety of sources…either from a centralized
server that stores these files or directly from the hard drives of
other program users.
The basic idea
behind file sharing programs is just what it says - to share, to allow
others to utilize freely songs, files, programs that you have on your
computer system.
If all computer
users out there were responsible about ensuring that files on their
computer hard drives are free of viruses and other security problems
there would be less to worry about. However, these days hackers and
virus writers are simply renaming Trojan Horses and files containing
viruses to the names of popular songs, programs, files, etc. You really
can't be certain, anymore, as to exactly what you are getting when
you download one of these types of files to your computer. There are
no guarantees of safety…
Additionally,
look at it from this perspective. If someone can gain access to your
hard drive to upload a file to their own system, wouldn't it be quite
easy for that same individual to download a file, possibly containing
a Trojan Horse or virus, to your system? Why not? The whole concept
behind these types of programs is file sharing…opening up the directories
and files on your computer to everyone.
These file sharing
programs are beginning to be thought of as risky by virtue of the
fact that potentially, your system files and other important files
on your system can be altered or compromised by unknown parties using
the same program that you are using… If you must utilize these
types of programs, create a separate directory on a drive that does
not contain your system files and make sure that you only allow access
to that specific directory.