I'm running FC1 on an old Thinkpad 600. It's been wonderful, even as I've slugged it out getting the MWave modem and quirky soundcard to work. But now I think I'm really stuck. I'm trying to connect to a Microsoft VPN at work. I think that PPTP is the way to go, but I lack the basic knowledge for setting it up as a client. Has anybody done this, or have some ideas of what to try? Thanks!

(You need to have kernelsources installed. You will need them anyway, for the module bsd_comp.o is missing in the fedora kernel (WHY??). So you have turn bsd-compression off or rebuild the module for your kernel, at least that's what I did.)

On Saturday 01 May 2004 3:29 am, Christoph Wickert wrote: >Am Sa, den 01.05.2004 schrieb Christoph Wickert um 04:07: > > >>(You need to have kernelsources installed. You will need them anyway, >>for the module bsd_comp.o is missing in the fedora kernel (WHY??). So >>you have turn bsd-compression off or rebuild the module for your kernel, >>at least that's what I did.) >> >> >Ooops; I forgot the most important step: >download and install: >http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/pptpclient/pptp-linux-1.4.0-1.i386.rpm > >[snipped] > >Christoph > > However, if you search the net, you will find MANY documents telling you why you should not do this. PPTP is a VERY insecure method. (Sorry bit I can't cite anything specific here as it's a while since I investigated this stuff - I decided on the more restrictive but more secure port forwarding over SSH. (Other methods are available. No guarantee is provided either implied..........you know what I mean)).

Am Di, den 04.05.2004 schrieb Gary Stainburn um 14:43: >However, if you search the net, you will find MANY documents telling you why >you should not do this. PPTP is a VERY insecure method. > Hey, I never told anybody to use PPTP. In fact, I usually tell people to use OpenVPN or IPSec. >(Sorry bit I can't cite anything specific here as it's a while since I >investigated this stuff - I decided on the more restrictive but more secure >port forwarding over SSH. (Other methods are available. No guarantee is >provided either implied..........you know what I mean)). short: http://www.schneier.com/pptp.html long: http://www.schneier.com/paper-pptpv2.html Quote: "7 Conclusions Microsoft has improved PPTP to correct the major security weaknesses described in [SM98]. However, the fundamental weakness of the authentication and encryption protocol is that it is only as secure as the password chosen by the user." Ok, it all depends on the password (and not on keys or certs). Now take a look at: http://mopo.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/pptp_mschapv2/pptp_mschapv2.html Quote: "Conclusions While testing this software, we used a dictionary of about three gigabytes containing about 74 million words. Equipped with this, we were able to derive all passwords used in our test network in about four hours. It is true that dictionary attacks tend to fail on good passwords, but it is enough to have one password to break into a system. The step to gaining root access (or doing any other kind of abuse) from there is small." So I fully agree with you, Garry: Everybody, please do not use pptp. It might be sufficient for a dialup with your laptop, but I would not dare using it for a production system. Christoph