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this post was submitted on 18 May 2024
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Weird News - Things that make you go 'hmmm'
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That's how consumer PCs were often setup back in the early XP days though. There was a time when a household typically didn't have more than one computer or internet connected device. So people didn't have a NAT-ing router and instead connected their DSL or cable modem directly to their PC, and were completely exposed to the internet. To make matters worse, the firewall was disabled by default in early XP versions as well, until SP2.
This is how Sasser and the Blaster worm were able to wreak havoc, and until home routers started to become common, it was a genuine concern that on a new XP installation you'd be hacked before you had time to patch.
In the early days we learned a lot of things about security through trial-and-error, basically running head-on into the issues, and then going "oh...".
This isn't a test of the "early days" XP and internet. This is a test of current day, because clearly the implication is "look how bad it is to use XP in 2024"
Was it disabled? I thought that XP just didn't have a firewall and got one added later on. I forget which virus it was but RPC would crash within seconds of a device being connected to the internet meaning you had to reboot.
Edit
Apparently it was MSBlaster
According to Wikipedia, it used to be called Internet Connection Firewall in early versions of XP and then was rebranded to Windows Firewall and turned on automatically in SP2.