Windows Server Protection

[aggiedude]

Just recieved a server for the office. It is going to be mostly used as a file server for new office app. However we are going to also use it as a web server so that people can access their account data from home. What sort of protection do I need on this system? I have a firewall in place but what is the right way to go for Anti-Virus or any other software items I need running to insure the system will not get infected?

Thanks in advance!

-aggiedude

[miahosting]

Turn if off, your windows server will be secured ;)
lol....

[LSComputers]

Hello aggiedude,

There are serveral things you can do I would recommend either AVG or Avast antivirus software, these both have basicly live scanning to monitor that nothing is being placed on the server that is harm full, and you can set it up to delete the file as soon as it makes contact with the computer.

Other things you should run are adware or spybot or both. This would allow you to make sure things such as cookies, spyware isnt slowing down the machine. This stuff needs to be ran roughly once an week, at minimum.

Hope all this helps

[aggiedude]

Thanks to both of you! That definatly tells me where I need to head here.

miahosting....i was forced with Microsoft, ugh. Its like a client asked me once "Does your software run on Linux?", "Yes, May I ask why?", "I prefer something I don't have to restart every hour"

[fireshark]

Close unnecessary services, and run the Server Configuraty thing (if you're running Server 2003) to configure the proper roles for the server (web and file).

[AvailNetworks]

here is a great document from microsoft themselves. It is quite a long read but you should be able to narrow down exactly what you want to do

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=8A2643C1-0685-4D89-B655-521EA6C7B4DB&displaylang=en

[aggiedude]

Okay, not to pull this out of the depths. But its seems that Avast is offering the best plan if you ask me. Roughly $300 a year protects my server and my client computers. However, I could just get server protection. By just going server protection I would be saving a good deal of money. I know that most anti-virus makers want you to have "centralized management" etc. but is that really needed?

Also, what are some good spy ware protection options?