FootstepsOG
join:2004-02-17
Tucson, AZ
|  Both the German and Chinese governments have considered banning MS-Windows from the nation's networks due to the common knowledge (something you can read in popular news magazines) that exported versions have US government backdoors. They decided, however, that the economic result would be too costly. When options do exist, however, the worst software to purchase from oversea vendors is your security applications (laws of one nation don't provide much protection for the citizens of another). SUN's security suites, for example, are all written in Russia (how safe does that make you feel?). More importantly, though, the most popular firewall in America is exported from Isreal (Checkpoint). Sidewinder G2 from Secure computing is the most common firewall on NSA networks and has never had a security patch (while Cisco PIXes, etc. have had many). IMHO, Sidewinder is the best firewall (also packaged with systems from Dell). If I lived in Isreal, on the other hand, I might be suggesting not to buy from American vendors. For home use, the $60 Linksys BEFSR41 does more that older NAT routers. |
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