Thread: BlockList Manager and Peerguardian

latest beta PeerBlock 1.0+ (r404)

Release Notes

Code:

This is our latest Beta Release, released June 9, 2010. 

Beta Releases contain newer fixes and features than our Stable Releases, and by definition not necessarily as stable.  While we have tested them out internally, until they've been included in Beta Releases for awhile we won't really consider them to have received enough "airtime" to be considered ready for inclusion in a new Stable Release.  They are also released much more frequently than Stable Releases, generally once every few weeks (instead of once every few months) - if the frequency of update notices annoys you, install a Stable Release instead!

 
What's New

Here are the major changes since the most recent Beta Release, r320:

    * Better "Last Updated" handling for list-update checking - Many users have been experiencing problems with updated lists not being detected, after iblocklist.com's change to start reporting actual last-modified timestamps.   We should now be correctly catching updated lists.
    * Updated History Setting Defaults - Changed the defaults for History settings to "Remove every 7 days" and Max Size = 100 MB.  If your settings have these left at the old defaults, PeerBlock will pop up a window during your first run that advises you that it's making these changes.  This should help prevent problems with history.db becoming corrupted and/or growing to an absurd size.
    * Changed Systray-icon Left-click Handling - New behavior:  If the window is minimized, restore it.  If the window is at all hidden by other windows, bring it to top.  If window is already at top, minimize it.
    * Changed "Allow HTTP for X min" Visible Handling - If you select the "Allow HTTP for X min" option in the right-click menu, that option will now be highlighted.  Previously, it would highlight the "Allow HTTP" button.   Also note that transitioning from one Allow HTTP state to another will not start Blocking HTTP, only clicking a currently-selected Allow HTTP option will restart HTTP Blocking.
    * New Manually-settable Options - Added two options to the peerblock.conf config-file, for people who don't like some of the new features we've added during our Beta period.  "ListSanityChecking" lets you disable the List-add Sanity-checking (for dupes, non-iblocklist URLs, etc.) by setting it to "no"; "WarningIconForHttpAllow" lets you make it so that we will not change to a yellow "warning" icon if you're Allowing HTTP, if you set it to "no".
    * New Splashscreen and Installer Pic - These have been updated with some new images sent in by the new Graphics Guy on our team, Mourad.

Additional minor changes can be found on the r404 Changes page.

A problem -if I remember correctly- with PG was it had no action on an already established connection with ip filtered IPs: One day, I forgot to run PG and started emule first (and PG after a while). I then saw there were data flows between me and some IP considered as bad by the filters PG was using.

I don't know if the same problem may occur with PeerBlock.


I currently use P2PFire, and I'm very satisfied by this tool: It's very light, and with its ability to manage 4 IPs lists (block.p2p guarding.p2p, ipfilter.dat and white.p2p) that it optimizes before usage (eliminating redundancy), it shares some basics feature with BLM. BLM can do much more for sure, but I find this app too bloated for a basic usage. Moreover -again if I remember correctly- P2PFire forbid connections, while PG (and PB I tthink) only blocks data flows. On this aspect, P2PFire looks like a bit more secure to me. The only thing I regret with P2PFire is its unability to update IPs lists via http links usage: You ave to manuallly download the lists, unrar/zip them, and copy/paste to guarding;P2p, block.p2p, ipfilter.dat or white.p2P, which is boring when you upload your lists on a regular basis (e.g every weeks).


A feature I would like to find in such apps is the ability to block only uploads to some "semi filtered" Ips. Do you know a mean/a soft able to do that ?

Originally Posted by Renk

A feature I would like to find in such apps is the ability to block only uploads to some "semi filtered" Ips. Do you know a mean/a soft able to do that ?

You need a certain degree of upload to be able to download from them (TCP overhead).

Peerblock blocks all protocols to and from blocked IPs ie it blocks as u would put it all connections and "data flows". And PeerBlock can handle man many block lists, downloaded from its own site or customised 3rd party

and wot do u mean by "semi-filtered" as in u want to block RIAA but not MPAA, I dont think u mean that but semi sounds strange

U can manually add exceptions in PeerBlock, right click
choose allow 15min, 1 hr, permanent

Originally Posted by saebrtooth

and wot do u mean by "semi-filtered" as in u want to block RIAA but not MPAA, I dont think u mean that but semi sounds strange

What he wants to achieve is being able to download from "semi-filtered" hosts, but not upload to them in P2P. However, that isn't really possible - the PeerBlock team couldn't "hard" disable upload, as you need to upload TCP overhead (ACK packets, etc.) to be able to download from anyone.

i agree its not possible, u have to make contact in order to download even if u dont upload

Originally Posted by Renk

When noup feature is activated, you download data from people who are unable to download data from you (except some trivial overhead).

That trivial overhead is the key

The only way to achieve what you want would be if PeerBlock had some kind of protocol analyzing code that will take out "real" upload from connections... and you can imagine the CPU usage... so it's pretty much impossible.

Originally Posted by Renk

I "semi understand" what you wrote, surely because I remain a n00b is this area (although a n00b laboriously trying to learn).

No worries. I'm not exactly an IT pro, either.

The feature that I think would be as sending to some recipients belonging to some list, only "white letters", with only the recipient's address (for the postmant do his job), a request ("I'm searching for that thing") and your own address (for the recipient be able to send you the thing you are searching).

This makes sense, is possible and is actually how no upload operates in the eMule SBI mod, for example, but is beyond the capabilities of an IP blocker like PeerBlock.

Renk from ur posts what u mean by semi-filtered maybe should be named one-way flter. What u describe unfortunately is something everyone would like to have emule/bt etc but security or practically not feasable. Even if u were able to real download from anti p2p orgs and routing to a proxy and then route it again to ur real the stuff u download would be very likely be fake.

But good idea