A Hobbyist DECnet Network

[Sridhar Ayengar]

Robert Armstrong wrote:
>>How would you protect these older systems against abuse from 
>>the random crackers?  VMS is probably tolerably safe in 
>>current versions, if properly managed, but I'm betting there 
>>are problems with other OSes. You could do vpns, I suppose.
> 
> 
>   Depends on what you mean.   Ordinary ("ordinary" :-) people who don't have
> a VAX running Multinet and join the "network" wouldn't be able to get in to
> any of the DECnet machines.
> 
>   However, it is true that the Multinet DECnet virtual circuit over IP has
> virtually no security.  It would be easy, if you knew a little bit about
> DECnet and were so motivated, to sniff or spoof the traffic.  Probably there
> just aren't many hackers out there who know enough about DECnet to worry
> about, and they have better targets for their efforts.
> 
>   Yes, you could solve the problem with VPNs.  Multinet v5.1 seems to have
> the ability to do IPSEC, but I have no experience with that feature.  If
> it's anything like IPSEC on a PC, it's a lot of overhead for a poor VAX.

Ciscos will do DECnet Phase IV secure tunnels over IP too.  So will IBM 
Mainframes.

Peace...  Sridhar