Try something like ZoneAlarm of Kerio. These are fire wall programs and either will ask if you want to allow this or that program to access the "OutSide World" and therefore can also be used to limit your computer from being used clandestinely. It's still a Winderz problem though. All those holes left in place for what ever reason (Some as over sites most to slip so called "enhancements" in, and still others for just plain ole' stupidity) are gonna temps certain types of people to do what they can just because they can. Over all short of not being connected at all a firewall is your best option.

----- Original Message -----

From: RENRAD1@aol.com

Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 5:55 PM

Subject: Re: [Fractint] Re: Mark and WinDoZe 98

In a message dated 7/13/06 2:39:19 PM Pacific Daylight Time, dmj@fractalus.com writes:

garbage onto
the net for everyone else to deal with. And there won't be any more
patches, as Microsoft has officially ended support for it.

Keep it disconnected from the net entirely or make sure it's behind a thick
firewall

um. I don't really have much choice. Can anyone recommend a way to see IF a win98 se machine is sending out junk at the behest of someone else? If I can find something that alerts me to 'zombie' use, maybe I can keep things to a minimum? I'm using avg's free antivirus, and it's filter, trojan hunter and it's 'guard' (the guard, i'm told, isn't very good, though) and spybot, and run Advanced System optimizer with those when things start to drag or hang.

Thanks for any assistance,