RealPlayer and RH6.1 revisited

Ron Peterson rpeterson at yellowbank.com
Wed Feb 16 17:22:06 EST 2000


Derek Atkins wrote:
> 
> Do you allow SecureHTTP (HTTP+SSL, usually port 433) through your
> firewall?  If so, you wont be able to inspect it.  Do you do stateful
> inspections of all your emails?  All your Usenet posts?  Do you
> monitor all your telnet sessions character by character?

I understand your point.  But I was asking about realaudio.  Which
certainly *can* be blocked, if you have the right tools.  Even on port
80.

So again, my question is, has anyone seen such a tool available as an
application that runs on Linux?

I'm not trying to start an argument, but even philosophically, I must
say I disagree with the "all or nothing" approach to making Internet
resources available to my staff.  There are clearly any number of
security vulnerabilities that need to be addressed.  But they need to be
addressed.  Not presented as inevitable consequenses of living in a
connected world that we can do nothing about.  I don't believe that for
a second.

When I run SSL, I know who's running it.  When I allow HHTP, it's
available to everyone.  I'm not worried about Usenet because it's
predominately text.  What concerns me is bandwidth.  I don't have much,
and can't afford much.  I don't want to simply ignore the problem, and I
don't want to become the office gestapo.  I just want to block
realaudio.

And I'll deal with other problems as they come up.
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