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Date: Wed, 16 Apr 2003 10:58:20 -0700 (PDT)
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To: mobile@freebsd.org
From: John Polstra <jdp@polstra.com>
In-Reply-To: <20030416105033.H46401-100000@moo.sysabend.org>
References: <20030416105033.H46401-100000@moo.sysabend.org>
Organization: Polstra & Co., Seattle, WA
Subject: Re: "broadcast ping" message
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In article <20030416105033.H46401-100000@moo.sysabend.org>,
Jamie Bowden  <ragnar@sysabend.org> wrote:
> On Wed, 16 Apr 2003, John Polstra wrote:
> 
> > To make a FreeBSD system respond to broadcast pings, you have to set
> > the sysctl variable net.inet.icmp.bmcastecho to 1.
> 
> Shouldn't the default be to DTRT and respond unless disabled?  Until now,
> the only systems on my network that didn't respond to broadcast pings were
> my windows boxes, but I consider them broken by default.  Why has the
> default behavior changed, and isn't this a POLA issue?

It was changed for security reasons.  Responding to broadcast pings
creates several potential denial of service attacks.

John
-- 
  John Polstra
  John D. Polstra & Co., Inc.                        Seattle, Washington USA
  "Disappointment is a good sign of basic intelligence."  -- Chögyam Trungpa