Installed Zone Alarm and now I have one OPEN port

Hi,
After much searching and reading, I finally installed ZoneAlarm. I immediately went to Shields Up to check my pc and on the ports test everything came up stealth except Port 25 (SMPT) which came up open.
I didn't give AOL any server privilege because the faqs said you could have an open port if you did - I just gave it a checkmark.
My question is which is better:
Everything stealth and one open port; or
one stealth and all closed ports (which I had before installing ZA??
This open port isn't making me feel too great about security at the moment.
Thanks for any thoughts on this.
Sincerely, Nancee

Also, if I keep this running, is it necessary for me to have the deskband on my taskbar? I have the icon at present.

Another thing, with this open Port is Zone Alarm protecting that open port??? Or am I more vulnerable than before? https://discussions.virtualdr.com/
Thanks.
Nancee

NanceeI0,After reading your post,i went to GRC and had the test run. First time i checked since i had cable installed a week ago. I run only ZA along with IPE for my AV and i have "never" had AOL on my machine in any form including AIM.
My test came up with "all" ports at stealth.

I may be wrong,but it's just one more reason i will never have anything from AOh*ll installed...Or,,M$ Mess,,for that matter...

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Headin' over there>>>

Nancee10, as you are probably aware by now port 25 is used to send mail out from yr mail client. What client are you using firstly? Do you have Norton Antivirus installed? I had this problem with NAV installed, and they recommend trying to d/l virus updates 2 or 3 times in a row! yr port, to the best of my knowledge should be closed at all times, till you send mail. The zone alarm deskband can be right clicked/send to tray or just click on the "X" in the top r/h/ corner. This will not close ZA down...will investigate further.... Try updating NAV if u have it, then close browser/reboot machine and reconnect.....send yrself an e-mail, recieve it, then head on over to GRC port probe and try again.

I also agree with the poster above. I have spent most of my computing life steering people away from AOL. It is the most invasive and restrictive piece of software known to man, bar maybe Realplayer :-( If you can ditch AOL, Please do!!!!

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Warmest regards, Chris
Dell Inspiron 8000 Notebook
P3/600 256mb ram
32 mb ATI Mobility M4 AGPx4 video card
Win 2K Pro SP Installed

A reformat fixes everything!

[This message has been edited by statesman (edited 01-26-2002).]

Hello Nanceel0, having Port 25 open, is fine if sending email {Outgoing Mail; (SMTP)}, in ALL other times it indicates the presence of a mass emailing worm or something else equally as pathetic.

type at the MS-DOS prompt
netstat -a -n -r 5
and let us know what is active when browser closed and email closed.
Luke.

statesman, real player can be hacked into a REAL timid, plain old RAM player, it takes some reg work but mine never phones home, nor redirects to ADD sites.
Actually I read the licence and they said I cannot do this or they can sue me, jeesh I`m REAL scared,
LOL.

Hi Everyone!
It took me over 3 hours to get here and read your letters. When I turned on my pc and signed onto AOL I got a ZA box "Firewall has blocked internet access to 64.l2.12.etc(aol) from your computer!!! It gave me no options and although I could get to the AOL welcome screen I couldn't use the IE browser or AOL browser!
I went to msconfig and unchecked the 3 ZA items and still no joy! I then changed a lot of settings (undid internet and local server locks; unchecked the enable lock; and THEN gave AOl server privileges) I still couldn't use my browser. Called AOL and he gave me ZA's phone number https://discussions.virtualdr.com/.
I finally (help from a chat room which I could access)put my internet security slider to medium and I could use IE.
I then checked my Shields and Ports - Shields stealth, and one NetBios port stealth and everything else closed!
So I don't know why I installed ZA because those are the settings I had without it.
I use AOL mail, so I don't think that SMTP would apply to that, but I don't know.
I have more questions about these settings, but I'm going to do that msdos test Lukeg suggested and I'll report back.
BTW, I am getting disillusioned with AOL.
Thanks everyone.
Sincerely, Nancee

Well, that test was an experience - I couldn't shut it down, I finally x'd out of it even though Windows said it couldn't close it - it just kept going and I had no cursor to type in exit.
The results said this (over and over again)

Route Table
Active Routes
Network Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
127.000 25.500 127.001 127001 1
255.255.etc 255.255.etc 0.0.0 1

Active Connections
Route(?) Local Address Foreign Address State

there was nothing under this. But it just kept going and going.


I'm hoping that since there was nothing listed under active connections I'm okay.
~~~~~~~~~
I don't understand why I was able to surf with IE last night with my Internet Setting on high and today I couldn't. And why ZA gave me the box saying AOL was blocked from my computer but not giving me a choice. I had the checkmark in for AOL in programs.
It also told me my multimedia keyboard wanted something and let me choose (that's HP spyware which I had no idea was doing anything).
At this point I'm quite confused, but I'm glad that at least I can use my IE again.
Sincerely, Nancee

{Edit - I just attempted to use Autodownload for InnoculateIT - I twice gave permission to ZA, then I got InnIt timed out, twice. Shut down ZA and it still timed out - so unless there's a problem with InnIt site, does ZA slow things down too? I'm really not happy with this ZA!}

[This message has been edited by Nanceel0 (edited 01-27-2002).]

Hi Nancee - I believe that your problems are an AOL issue. If you read Dala's post 72 Worms. She is a Compuserve user (AOL owned) and had past problems with ZoneAlarm and is now having difficulty with Tiny Firewall.

I use ZoneAlarm and it purrs along on my PC however I am not an AOL user.

[This message has been edited by AnnMarie (edited 01-27-2002).]

Ahhh - poop - my first double post - got a 404 error and didnt think it had registered https://discussions.virtualdr.com/

[This message has been edited by AnnMarie (edited 01-27-2002).]

Hi AnnMarie,
I think you may be right. I mainly hear good things about ZA and yet I'm having problems. I have read where some people with AOL had problems with it, but then, some not. So before I installed it I went to an AOL chatroom and two people there had no problems with it.
Meanwhile, I lost my browsers again! Then I put ZA on (to look at the help) and it reported that multimedia keyboard again so I clicked on "more info" and it gave me the ZA page! so I got the browser back for now.
I was reading the faqs online, so I guess I'll stop CD Creator from loading and maybe remove IE and AOL from programs and let them reestablish themselves. But at this point I don't have much hope.
I read the link you gave - she manually removed ZA. Those instructions are brutal.
I just hope I don't have to do a format and recovery.
If I'm not back, it means I can't use my browser. This is not fun. https://discussions.virtualdr.com/
Sincerely, Nancee