On Thu, 2004-10-14 at 21:25 +0200, Alexander Dalloz wrote: > I must say that I do not understand that argument. It would be same as > saying: SSH is useless, because it's enryption of the transfered > information induces a sense of security, while it does not protect > against the usage of secure passwords. That is not an accurate or fair comparison (even though I know you meant "insecure" passwords). SSH's encryption does protect effectively against anyone sniffing your password, and they will have to attempt a dictionary or social-engineering attack to get it... but SSH itself is not easily or trivially defeated. Portknocking can be sniffed, analyzed, and defeated by someone with access to the wire, making it a trivially-defeatable measure for *some* attackers. This is a far cry from SSH, but it's also a far cry from "useless" since most attackers worldwide do not have the ability to sniff your wire for the right packets. IMHO: Portknocking is a useful addition to my "defense in depth" strategy, providing a small additional measure of marginal protection to my system. Of course, it is not a replacement or substitute for any standard security measures... it should be additional. And it *can* lure naÃve users into a false sense of security; but so can many other things. Cheers, -- Rodolfo J. Paiz <rpaiz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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