A look at ASPs (Application Service Providers)
ASP are an 'emerging technology' as the press likes to call it. The idea is customers of the service can subscribe to the applications of there choice hosted on foreign servers in order to allow them to run on more antiquated hardware, or simply to pay less than the total cost of the application. Ideally one would be able to run heavier software, such as Windows 2000, on an i386 or the like. Essentially, it turns your home PC into a dumb terminal, which is connected (via the net) to the providers servers.
You do not necessarily have to run the entire O/S over the link, but that is how it is being marketed lately. This 'emerging technology' is nothing but mainframe networking with a new twist. The problem lies, well, the whole damn thing is a problem. Everything, every little thing you do on your home 'PC' will be causing traffic over the already-slightly-crowded net. Not only does this cause pain for the rest of us, but it creates many, many opportunities for crackers who find themselves looking for a break from real challenges. It creates a massive breeding ground for the all-annoying 'script-kiddie'.
All one has to do in order to mess with you is know your I.P. Address. After that they can literally watch every move you make on your home 'PC' with just a little work. All of your financial information, all your passwords, all your e-mails, all of everything will be transferred over the net. Encrypting the transfers would only make it a more worthy challenge. Then the cracker is forced to get the key, but that is never much of a problem. Hell, own the providers themselves and you have instant access to _all_ there customers data. Say a disgruntled competing company has it out for you. All they have to do is hire there friendly local 'merc' cracker to destroy there competition's 'HDD'. More lag on the net and security breaches are only two of the potential problems with this 'emerging technology'.
However, in the end APS may very well be able to work them out. If they connect to 'PCs' via dial up or the like, the data wouldn't be moving through the void for the world to see, and the connection would undoubtedly be faster. However, I have yet to see an ASP that offers direct connections. All they would need is a modified setup for an ISP, and many, many problems will cease (mostly) to exist. That way, at least the cracker would have to own the ISP/ASP in order to watch your system.
Beware these moronic services, just buy a freaking PC for a couple a hundred bucks and run the applications normally. A i368 was never meant to run Win2K (though Linux would work well), it simply cannot support it. Having another machine you have never seen work your stuff is not the answer.
1.) Review: Norton Internet Security 2000 - Dhillon Andrew
2.) Dreamcast Underground - 101Bytez
3.) A look at ASPs (Application Service Providers) - Liquid Sphear
4.) Quake III on Linux - L33tdawg
5.) ID Theft - What they do - Hunterose
6.) Reversing a trojan - metaray!abrams
