Security Issues and Questions

[iXPhound]

Hi All:

First off I apologize for the possibility that I am posting in the wrong room. I looked through the titles and this forum seemed to be the most likely to help.

Ok...I am in the unfortunate position of being an IT person that has been thrown into a security position of which I admitidly know little. At my location we are running in a Windows 2000 AD enviornment. Our department sits behind a checkpoint NG firewall. The issue is this: Another department in our org wants to use a notification system called The Communicator. This system seems to require me to open inbound/outbound UDP ports 137 and 138.

It also requires me to setup a trust to a domain outside of our firewall. I also have to create shares of the client C:\ for this "The Communicator".

Like I said I know little about network security. Can anyone help me with issues about the above because it seems a little unsafe to me?

TIA!!!!!!

 

[brontosaurus]

It's very unsecure, you're right. I don't know how detailed your firewall configs can get, but you'd do yourself a service to only open those ports directly to the IP addresses of the server(s) that needs them. Block everyone else, or you're inviting the world to browse your internal networks...

 

[GlenJohnson]

You might contact the other department, ask them where this software came from and is there any tech support from the company. Personally, I wouldn't open any ports without making sure the person requesting this knows what there talking about. A lot of people hear about this really nifty software, but aren't computer savvy enough to know if it's good, (Secure in your case.) or bad. Talking to the teck support people who supply the program would be where I start. Good luck. Glen A. Johnson
Microsoft Certified Professional
glen@nellsgiftbox.com


"They believe that nothing will happen because they have closed their doors."
Maurice Maeterlinck (1862-1949); Belgian author