Thursday, June 17, 2004

Keeping an Eye on Internet Health

Keeping an Eye on Internet Health



Here's a tiny program that runs in the system tray of your Windows box and displays the current health status of the Internet. The ISCAlert utility tracks the Infocon status that is set by the Internet Storm Center, whose volunteer handlers monitor the Internet for security issues. When the icon is green, all is safe and clear, but when it turns red, you know something fishy is going on in your cyber-neighborhood. ISCAlert is a free tool that was written by Tom Liston, Internet Storm Center handler, and author of LaBrea. As Tom succinctly put it, "Infocon status is used to reflect changes in malicious traffic and the possibility of disrupted connectivity on the Internet."