Ok, now we're going in other directions. I was mainly referring to P2P apps. If someone is totally stupid about computers and leave them without firewalls or AV's then, yeah, of course it's possible to be open to the world and not realize it. but in XP if you dont have your windows firewall enabled then you get spammed as soon as you go online via IE browser right? so, if that person had half a brain, they would enable their firewall.

Andy's orginal post had to do with Limewire being open with users not knowing about it and I say itd too far fetched. Ive used p2p since Napster and I have yet to be wide open.The only thing users can browse on me is my shared folder, nothing more.

as far as the rest, meh. Why worry about someone elses computer being left open if they used a P2P app in the past? and, as far as I know once you uninstall a P2P the shared folders go with it, thats why I find it hard to believe.

and if she has a new computer then Im sure she must have her firewall enabled, if not, then shes not the user whos running it.

*shrug.