simon, thanks for being patient here. i really appreciate your approach here.<br><br>On Sun, Oct 21, 2012 at 12:01 AM, Simon Kenyon <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:simon@koala.ie" target="_blank">simon@koala.ie</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<div class="gmail_quote"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">you have a deep seated concern </blockquote><div><br>deep seated _justified_ concern, from what i can gather.<br>
<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">that your safety and security is<br>
compromised by the technology that you use. without a *firm* grasp of<br>
the underlying principles that guide the design and construction of that<br>
technology; you are forever beholden to rely on others.<br>
<br></blockquote><div><br>yyup. ya gotta work out who to trust, freebirds. logically think the chain through.<br><br>you can rely on SHA and MD5 checksums. you can trust the linux distros if they're checksum'd. you can rely on CD recorders if you can use a different CD *reader* to verify the MD5 checksum. you can use chrootkit and rkhunter to checksum the programs on the hard drive (your best bet here is again removing the drive, putting it into a USB enclosure and using a machine that's disconnected from the internet and is kept locked in a safe when unused, or even thrown away and a new one bought 2nd-hand just for the job, or use other peoples' computers once and only once, booted off of a trusted verified live CD)<br>
<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
you might consider going to a good bookshop and getting a few good<br>
(paper) books. pretty much everything by o'reilly is worth looking at.<br></blockquote><div><br> yes. actually. this is a great idea. it will stop you focussing on the problem.<br><br> much as i hate to say this, many of the questions you're asking aren't entirely appropriate for the target audience here: basic linux sysadmin analysis for example.<br>
<br> you need to get yourself up-to-speed, and doing so "offline" - paper books - would be a very good way to do that.<br><br>l.<br></div></div>