Dear DamianUK

Peerless and RaaF have covered most things you need to protect your PC from being hijacked, someone other than you controlling it.

But I would like to emphasise a point that you should think about, once you have installed your firewall, ZoneAlarm or whatever, you must learn to configure it properly and check that it is working to the best of its ability.

A firewall is the first defense against your PC being attacked and it is extremely important that your PC ports, all 65,535 of them, are properly stealthed, i.e. invisible to the internet and can resist being scanned or directly attacked.

Once you have your firewall installed you should then test it at Shields Up test site:

https://www.grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2

This will tell you whether your firewall is fully protecting your PC.



UK Bob