To get rid of the inappropriate pictures, you need to find out where they are stored. Bring up your Screensaver Preferences dialog (Preferences->Screensaver if you're using GNOME) and go to the Advanced tab. You will see a static box labeled "Image Manipulation." I would guess that you have a box checked that reads "Choose Random Image:" with a field below it naming a directory. That directory is where those files are stored. First, eliminate the directory from that Image Manipulation setting--get it to grab desktop images only for the time being. Second, go to the directory that was named and throw everything in it into the trash. And if it's symbolic links, you'll need to track them down and throw them away. (Trust me: you do /not/ want pictures such as you described on a work computer! That's a sexual-harassment lawsuit waiting to happen.)
If that is not what you find, then someone has indeed installed a different screensaver on your system, or else a slideshow viewer pointing to a folder containing the inappropriate graphics. This is why I never do updates as root--I always give the superuser password to an application I know and trust which requests it, and I do all my business while logged in as any user /but/ root.
Now as to how to keep the barn door locked: My first impression is that you need to enable the system firewall, even if you /do/ have a corporate firewall. Redundancy never hurts in security. Of course, you need to make sure you know what TCP and UDP ports have to be open for certain network processes to run. As long as you open those ports (as source /and/ as destination, to be safe) and restrict this to the subnetwork you have in your enterprise, your computer should be safe even if someone compromises the corporate firewall--or is making mischief inside the enterprise and hence already inside the firewall. Search on the word "iptables" for more information. (The iptables system and syntax took a long time for me to learn, until now I have a system that is /very/ particular about what transactions it allows, even between computers on my own network.)
Temlakos
Pat Pleate wrote:
Sorry about the last entry - I hit Enter too quickly. I just installed FC3 a couple of days ago. We have a
corporate firewall between our company and the
"outside world", so I left my the PC on but logged off
for the night. I logged in as my own account this
morning (which may be root equivalent, but I don't
know yet, I'm learning) and ran today's updates
(Thurs. 2/17). About 5 - 10 minutes later during the
time the updates were downloading/installing, I turned
around from my other workstation checking e-mail and
noticed that the FC3 screensaver was not legit - the
pictures were not work-related, i.e. nude women. I
suspect that my PC may have been broken into. I
looked at all the screensaver pics and didn't find any
nude women photo shots. I'm very suspicious of this
and would like some assistance from the experts. What
should I be checking for in the Linux world that would
be suspicious? I can easily find my way through
Novell and Windows, but don't have much background in
the Linux world and am humbly asking for your
assistance. Thanks in advance and have great day.
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