BitBox: World's Safest Browser

[George.J]

Ever heard of BitBox? Just came across this article now http://www.pcworld.com/businesscente..._security.html and wanted to share with all of you. Its much safer than sandboxing, worth a try if you dont care about the hefty 900MB download and that you're German

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/firefox-...ews-11203.html

What are your thoughts?

[deya]

Looks interesting, but that's one heck of a hefty download, and it also requires 2 gigs of HD space. I notice it has VirtualBox included as part of install so I'm wondering if that will conflict in some way with my other virtual program. It also recommends 64 bit and I'm running a 32 bit OS. Might give it a try though.

[J_L]

How in the world is it much safer than sandboxing? It is just another form of virtualization (virtual machine I believe), and I doubt it's more secure than Sandboxie with restrictions.

[George.J]

Originally Posted by J_L

How in the world is it much safer than sandboxing? It is just another form of virtualization (virtual machine I believe), and I doubt it's more secure than Sandboxie with restrictions.

I'll get back to you soon after when am free. For now, Bitbox is armoured FF encased in a VM environment (Oracle) and housed inside a Debian Linux (which is inturn more secure). Even though it looks highly complicated, it works just like a regular version of Firefox. I hardly believe that normal users would want to use this type of security except for these Germans and their so called "highly confidential military purposes".

Sandboxie is not perfect and foolproof. Even they say that it should not be your only line of defense. And Chrome's sandbox is less restricted than Sandboxie

How safe would I be, by using Sandboxie?

You would be quite safe using Sandboxie. It should be noted that, from time to time, people are able to find some vulnerability in Sandboxie, an open hole through which malicious software can still infiltrate the system.

This happens once every few months, on average, and is quickly resolved by closing the hole that is the attack vector.

Thus it's a good idea to have more traditional anti-malware software. This is is the subject of the following question.

Do I need other solutions if I use Sandboxie?

Sandboxie may be your first line of defense, but it should certainly be complemented by the more traditional anti-virus and anti-malware solutions. These solutions can let you know if your system does become infected in any way.

Typically, those other solutions employ various forms of pattern matching to discover malicious software and other threats. Sandboxie, on the other hand, quite simply does not trust any software code enough to let it out of the sandbox.

The combination of the two approaches should keep malicious software -- which is serving the interest of other unknown parties -- out of your computer.

Also Sandboxie fails to box, 3D games properly and is known to provide conflicts especially softwares having large download size. There are more con's. I'll mention them when I get free

[bo.elam]

Originally Posted by George.J

Sandboxie is not perfect and foolproof. Even they say that it should not be your only line of defense. And Chrome's sandbox is less restricted than Sandboxie

Also Sandboxie fails to box, 3D games properly and is known to provide conflicts especially softwares having large download size. There are more con's. I'll mention them when I get free

George, certainly SBIE is not perfect but it provides better and quieter protection against unknown threats than any traditional anti malware or HIPS and IF you learn how to use it properly, knowing what it can do for you and more importantly, what it can not do, then you can run it on its own.

Sure, the perfect scenario is to run SBIE along an AV but Sandboxie does run better and it will protect you better if you run it on its own since doing so, conflicts between security programs will be avoided. Ok.

Programs that install drivers, dont install sandboxed. You are underestimating SBIE and your comments show me that you never used it or used it for 5 days or something like that. I have been using it for almost 3 years and nothing has ever escaped the sandbox and today, I run SBIE alone with nothing else. It feels great.

What is safer, SBIE or BitBox? I don't know and I don't care if you want to claim that BB is safer. It does not matter to me. Anyway, SBIE is more along the lines of the old proverb,"speak softly and carry a big stick". Those words made famous by TR, pretty much tell the story behind SBIE.

Bo

[George.J]

Originally Posted by bo.elam

Programs that install drivers, dont install sandboxed. You are underestimating SBIE and your comments show me that you never used it or used it for 5 days or something like that. I have been using it for almost 3 years and nothing has ever escaped the sandbox and today, I run SBIE alone with nothing else. It feels great.
Bo

What's going on here now. I do know that programs that install drivers does not install sandboxed, as well as softwares that does need to set up configuration files and that needs to access the registry. Which part of my comment mentioned anything about the drivers and such. Probably you havn't been infected, but as they claim...

How safe would I be, by using Sandboxie?

You would be quite safe using Sandboxie. It should be noted that, from time to time, people are able to find some vulnerability in Sandboxie, an open hole through which malicious software can still infiltrate the system.

This happens once every few months, on average, and is quickly resolved by closing the hole that is the attack vector.

Thus it's a good idea to have more traditional anti-malware software. This is is the subject of the following question.

It should be noted, however, that Sandboxie does not typically stop sandboxed programs from reading your sensitive data. However, by careful configuration of the ClosedFilePath and ClosedKeyPath settings, you can achieve this goal as well.

Infiltrations have been reported once in a while. If you're working in a large organisations with lots of computers interconnected or having a highly confidential information, doesn't it mean that you're compromised to a large extent? Also you have to configure it to some extent for a desired level of protection. But BitBox works straight out of the box. An armoured FF encased in a VM environment (Oracle) and housed inside a Debian Linux is enough to know how safe it can be.

What is safer, SBIE or BitBox? I don't know and I don't care if you want to claim that BB is safer. It does not matter to me.

I gave a hyperlink from the reviewer who have tested it and it's not personally not just my claim. IMO these protection measures that implement various levels of security like BitBox is sure to impress large organisation or the military only. Whereas Sandboxie is for all the users.

Also you have to know that, VirtualPC or VirtualBox is much safer than Sandboxie as it has no LINK between the host OS therefore it is impossible for the infection to spread to the host. So, all you have to do is delete the Virtual OS and create a new one.

Towards the end of this thread you can see the comparison of Sandboxie and a Virtual Machine. http://www.sandboxie.com/phpbb/viewt...0351360cefb388 .

[bo.elam]

Originally Posted by George.J

Probably you havn't been infected, but as they claim...

Thats not a claim, it is a disclaimer.

Hey George, can you find me some threads, posts about users getting infected even though they are using SBIE properly. I am talking about real people George, not laboratory tests. OK.

http://www.sandboxie.com/phpbb/

Bo

[Taurus]

Originally Posted by bo.elam

Thats not a claim, it is a disclaimer.

Hey George, can you find me some threads, posts about users getting infected even though they are using SBIE properly. I am talking about real people George, not laboratory tests. OK.

http://www.sandboxie.com/phpbb/

Bo

I've been using Sandboxie for over a year now. I am very familiar with how it works and I have never seen a piece of "security software" that offers better or more complete protect.

[J_L]

Originally Posted by George.J

I'll get back to you soon after when am free. For now, Bitbox is armoured FF encased in a VM environment (Oracle) and housed inside a Debian Linux (which is inturn more secure). Even though it looks highly complicated, it works just like a regular version of Firefox. I hardly believe that normal users would want to use this type of security except for these Germans and their so called "highly confidential military purposes".

Sandboxie is not perfect and foolproof. Even they say that it should not be your only line of defense. And Chrome's sandbox is less restricted than Sandboxie






Also Sandboxie fails to box, 3D games properly and is known to provide conflicts especially softwares having large download size. There are more con's. I'll mention them when I get free

Interesting, Linux VM eh?

No software is.

3D games like? Add proper exclusions (if you even have to), and no such issues. I've downloaded gigabytes w/o problems.

[bo.elam]

Originally Posted by Taurus

I've been using Sandboxie for over a year now. I am very familiar with how it works and I have never seen a piece of "security software" that offers better or more complete protect.

Yeah, once the sandbox is restricted, only whats allowed to run in the sandbox and connect to the Internet, would do so and if we block access to sensitive files and folders, the protection becomes complete.

On top, all is done quietly.

Bo