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pultneytooner
17-Nov-06, 20:46
malicious Software Removal Tool

A lot of people don't realize it, but Microsoft automatically performs a virus scan on computers running Windows through the Malicious Software Removal Tool. The Malicious Software Removal Tool is an antivirus application that is kept up to date by Windows Update and is set to run periodically on Windows 2000, XP or Server 2003 computers.

Before you let your existing antivirus licenses expire though, you should know that the Malicious Software Removal Tool is not a substitute for the antivirus software that you are running now. That's because this tool only checks for the most common viruses and only runs periodic scans. It does not constantly monitor your file system for malicious changes like a normal antivirus application would.





Microsoft Office Visio 2003 Connector for the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer

One really neat security tool that you might not be aware of is the Visio 2003 Connector for the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA). If you have ever used Visio, you probably know that it is an effective tool for creating network diagrams. However, you aren't limited to creating these diagrams manually. You can create an MBSA-suitable diagram manually, but it's a lot easier to use LANsurveyor. You can use the LANsurveyor for Visio tool (it's in the Visio 2003 Resource Kit) to automatically create a Visio diagram of your network.

Once this diagram has been created, you can add in the Visio connector for the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer, and that allows you to initiate MBSA scans directly from Visio by clicking on computers that appear on the diagram. You can also import existing scan results. The diagram is then color coded to reflect the scan results. You can even view the MBSA report for each machine directly through Visio.



Cipher Security tool

You might be familiar with the CIPHER.EXE command that's built into the Windows operating system. Normally, the CIPHER.EXE command is used for encrypting or decrypting files on a computer's hard drive. Although the Cipher command is a part of the Windows operating system, Microsoft has created a new version that is available at TechNet.

The new version of CIPHER.EXE does all of the same things the old version does, but it has one noteworthy new feature. It has the ability to securely erase deleted files from the hard drive. As you probably know, when a file is deleted, it isn't actually gone. The reference to the file has been removed from the disk's directory, but the file itself still exists and is usually recoverable until it is overwritten by other files. The new version of CIPHER.EXE can be used to overwrite a deleted file so that it cannot be recovered.


http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315672 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315672)

blueivy
23-Nov-06, 17:45
Cipher Security tool

You might be familiar with the CIPHER.EXE command that's built into the Windows operating system. Normally, the CIPHER.EXE command is used for encrypting or decrypting files on a computer's hard drive. Although the Cipher command is a part of the Windows operating system, Microsoft has created a new version that is available at TechNet.


No mention is made of how many times and by what method the data is overwritten. US DoD (and therefore the UK government) recommend 7 I believe (or it may be 5) using random data.

Mr P Cannop
23-Nov-06, 17:56
is it ok to load up ie 7 ??