Hello Everyone!

I am very curious to know your oppinions about Deep Freeze as a security solution. I have been using it for a long time in this way.
Deep Freeze is a program that "freezes" your hard drive or a partition of your hard drive. After installing it, each time you reboot the computer, it will be in the same state as when you installed it. By "same state" I mean everything: files, paths, file content, file fragmentation, everything. It does not restrict your actions in Windows in any way. You can delete system-critical files, registry keys, you can infect your computer with virii, spyware, adware and all the nasty things. All will be gone on reboot. It does not affect your startup or shutdown time or speed of Windows operation. You can reboot in "thawed" mode, when you can install software and make modifications on files. More info at http://www.faronics.com/html/deepfreeze.asp.
The bad thing is that I think they only sell the product to large companies, libraries, etc. I got mine from a company that had extra licences.
I have only my C: partition frozen, D: and E: are thawed. On C: I have Windows and some software that I can realy trust, scanned with an anti-virus.If I reboot in "thawed" mode, I unplug my network cable, just to be sure. I do not have any anti-virus installed. I scan my D: and E: about every month. I also have a firewall.
At first, I tryed an antivirus(BitDefender) and firewall. But my computer seemed realy slow and I got infected with viruses that BitDefender could not delete. I reinstalled Windows about every week. If I hadn't found Deep Freeze I think I would now be typing in Linux .
From the begining I have been infected with only one virus(Win32.Jeffo.A), wich i got from a friend's computer, not the internet. I could succesfuly disinfect the files with Bitdefender .
I do not use Windows update, because I do not use default Windows programs like IE, MSN messenger, Outlook Express, File Sharing, etc. Am I still vulnerable , even if I do not use these programs?

So, what do you think about this security choice ?
Your help is apreciated.

Bye,
Jhon

Uhhhh ... well ... it sounds plausible, but you have to ask yourself what is the price you are paying for this "security choice" ? ... I mean it looks like it restricts you to a minimal level of functionality ... and you seem not to like Linux for some reason ... I was just wondering why ? I mean why bother to freeze your windows system into a state of minimal functionality .. you cant update you cant install preograms ... I guess deep freeze is an apporpriate name ...

If you are having that many problems with viruses and the like ... did you know that you can't get viruses on Linux ... and if you do they cannot affect your system ... the overall security of a Linux system is almost uncomparable to that of Windows ... what more can I say ...

Anyway ... my opinion is that this "security choice" is not the best possible option.

Ok, lemme share my experinece ... just a while ago I was still running Windows, and you might want to know that I am also paranoid. So, as you can imagine I had at least 10 different anti-spyware programs running and numerous security fixes that I had found through the years. I was running 2 firewalls .. my router hardware firewall and the software McAfee Firewall, which I both had set so pertty much nothing got through except exactly the program I was unsing at the time. I had the newest McAfee anti-virus ... bought it 2 months or so ago. And, I was still getting tons of adware and viruses ... the viruses were usually eleminated promptly ... but lots of trojans got though everything ... my security programs were worthless. Every time I found a new adware remover I installed it and it removed at least 10 new trojans off my computer. (The programs I installed were legitimate programs .. I know there are programs that will remove non-existent trojans and adware) It was a catch 22 ... there was no way out ... I mean if every new program found more and more trojans and viruses that the others missed then when will it end ? Were there an infinite number of trojans on my computer ? It seemed like it ... or maybe it was my paranoia ? Then, luckily ... I found out more about Linux ... from people on this very forum in fact, (thank you to everyone who helped me discover Linux). Ever since I've had Linux, there have been no viruses, no hackers, no adware, none of the stuff that was contributing to my headaches every now and then. So ... connecting this to deep freeze ... there was no way for me to get deep freeze, and it would not have helped, because I really need the ability to install programs and keep my system up to date ... I think that is a steep price to pay for security, while Linux is quite capable of everything Windows can do and far more. (If you are thinking about it, don't get Linspire, I don't reccomend it ... it has lots of compatability problems of modems in particular)

Thanks for responding.


If I want to install a program I first test it with Deep Freeze active. If I like it, then I reboot with Deep Freeze inactive for a session and I install it and it remains. I then boot with Deep Freeze active, again. I could also do Windows updates in this way, but I don't.

Well, yes and no. I am not an M$ fan, i don't like M$ at all. But I like windows. I am also trying to switch to Linux. I have had installed Mandrake 10.1, Fedora Core 3, Fedora Core 4. Now I have SUSE 10. In the boot menu I can't help it, I choose Windows . I also have many live CDs. One of the biggest reason for choosing Linux would be the speed, from what I understand. But here are some tests I did right now:
--------------------------------------------Windows XP---------------------SUSE 10
boot(to user login)----------------------------20s-----------------------------35s
user login---------------------------------------10s-----------------------------20s
start Firefox(first time from boot)-----------2.3s----------------------------4.8s

Windows has Deep Freeze, firewall, and another program on startup + defaults. I haven't installed anything on SUSE so only defaults. Also every Linux distribution seemed to run slower then Windows, I mean in general. Again, no modifications in Linux, so there may be ways to speed it up.
Windows is blamed alot for crashes. Explorer has caused me problems in the past, but in general programs don't crash if they don't have bugs. I sincerely haven't seen the BSOD from the begining of using XP. I don't know even if it exists in XP.
One more reason that attracts me to windows is the programs I use, witch I don't know if they exist in Linux. For example a virtual printer, Total Commander, text to speech( I think there is something in Linux called "Festival", but I couldn't even start it). And TV OUT doesn't work on Linux. I can't blame Linux for this because Nvidia decided not to release the source for their drivers.

Yes, I know that very few viruses for Linux exist. It's one of the reason I am trying to switch.

There is no doubt about that.
One question . Is there any firewall for Linux similar to ZoneAlarm, or any windows firewall? I mean, when a program tryes to connect to the internet, a dialog box comes up asking you if you want to let it or not.
BTW, nice story.

Well ... you are right about everything you said ... but if you really want to run Windows programs on a Linux system ... you may be able to ... Wine is now in beta stage ... it currently supports 2140 programs. http://appdb.winehq.org/appbrowse.php

As for the speed of boot and firefox loading and user login ... 10 seconds for me is nothing in comparison with the "security" that Linux offers ... particularly because I am paranoid about security

In general most Linux distros come with built-in firewalls like SE-Linux for Fedora Core ... there are 3rd party open source firewalls like Firestarter http://www.fs-security.com/ and SmoothWall http://www.smoothwall.org/ ... and they are free ... another advantage of Linux And ... I must say that they are better than ZoneAlarm ... far less bloated too ... and more features (I reccomend FireStarter ... it is the easiest to use and the best overall features)

If Windows works better than Linux, then I suppose you should use it, but in the future, things will change ... with Vista things will change a lot, so I dunno ... I know that I won't get Vista ... hardware req are just killer ... and monitor restrictions to "prevent the watching of pirated movies" ... I don't even watch movies on my computer ... it's just that to me Linux seems to be a better choice, but if Windows suits you then by all means use it.

Thanks for your support in this thread.

PS I don't think i'll get Vista eather.

Bye,
Jhon

yah, deep freeze is great!