Unlike entercept 2.0, Specter cannot automatically respond to an attack by disabling services or closing ports. But the SpecterRemote utility lets you monitor and reconfigure Specter from a remote PC running Windows. Externally, our test system appeared as a valid Linux server, complete with the default Apache Web server page and default directories. This held true when we toggled between Mac, Solaris, and Windows NT servers. Soon we got our first attempted FTP connections and an attempt to plant Sub-7.
Specter even detects DoS attacks and stops accepting connections to avoid resource starvation.
For the malicious Sub-7 hack attempt, we had enough information to contact the offender's ISP with a complete log of the event. The new comprehensive Log Analyzer lets you filter by the type of service or trap, making it easy to drill down to the details of each access attempt and even see the passwords and directories accessed during sessions. This useful information can help determine whether the attack is an inside job, as few businesses use internal firewalls. Specter requires a dedicated server, but this is a small price to pay for a early warning system that can be extremely effective at warding off attacks before they reach your real servers. Text Newsletters ZDNet Updates Update your software and make your PC run better.