Re: Is Active X safe?

Scott Klement wrote:

Hi Booth,

This is not clear enough for me Walden.  What websites would you run
from?  Any?  Some? All?  How do we decide the good guys from the bad?

It's a program. It's no different than downloading and running an EXE from a web site. Whomever wrote the EXE can do pretty much anything he/she wants.

For example, you could write a program in VARPG (since I know you use that) that deletes all of the files from the C:\Windows directory, thus causing problems on the comptuer running it. You could put that program up on your web site and say "Download this! It's really cool" and people might download and run it... Causing damage without them even knowing what it would do.

You could do the same thing with an ActiveX control, as well.

Of course, you'd never do that. You're an honest guy. So, if I saw an ActiveX control on your site, it'd probably be okay for me to install it. Likewise, I could probably trust IBM. Or Microsoft. Or my bank (assuming i've verified it's not phishing), etc.

But if I'm browsing someone's site who I don't know, and I don't have any real reason to trust them, I shouldn't just install any ActiveX control they ask me to.

Make sense?