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Date:      Sun, 14 Dec 2003 14:41:00 -0500
From:      Charles Swiger <cswiger@mac.com>
To:        Barney Wolff <barney@databus.com>
Cc:        net@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: Controlling ports used by natd
Message-ID:  <72143632-2E6D-11D8-824E-003065A20588@mac.com>
In-Reply-To: <20031213001913.GA40544@pit.databus.com>
References:  <200312120312.UAA10720@lariat.org> <20031212074519.GA23452@pit.databus.com> <6.0.0.22.2.20031212011133.047ae798@localhost> <20031212083522.GA24267@pit.databus.com> <6.0.0.22.2.20031212103142.04611738@localhost> <20031212181944.GA33245@pit.databus.com> <6.0.0.22.2.20031212161250.045e9408@localhost> <20031213001913.GA40544@pit.databus.com>

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On Dec 12, 2003, at 7:19 PM, Barney Wolff wrote:
> I have a real philosophical problem with ceding ports to worms, viruses
> and trojans.  Where will it stop?  Portno is a finite resource.

This is a respectable position, but the notion of categorizing ranges 
of ports into an association with a security policy already exists: 
bindresvport().

Perhaps one could argue that this limitation isn't that meaningful now 
that it's unfortunately common for malware to be running with root 
privileges-- or the Windows equivalent, more likely.  Still, if you and 
your users don't run untrusted programs as root, system permissions 
will prevent malware from acting as a rogue 
DHCP/DNS/arp/routed/NMBD/whatever server, sniffing the local network, 
etc...all of which contributes to slowing down the opportunities for 
and rate at which a worm spreads.

-- 
-Chuck



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