Clinton,
Let's say you work out of your home, and everything connected to the operation of your business resides on your computer. And then lets say (1) of your competitors also happens to be a computer hacker in his spare time as it's his hobby. Do I want to take the chance even if it's 1 in a 100,000 that this guy will access my computer, download my client base, contracts, and inside information on how my company operates? Not a fecking chance.

There are also a lot of people running web servers using Front Page, that have not password protected access to their web folders. I have found two instances of people I know, and I informed them of how vulnerable they were.

I'd rather err on the side of paranoia than trust that all of the millions of people who access the web and internet daily, have no interest in my computer. But I already know from the amount of spyware in the form of "cookies" that it ain't so. CNN and Yahoo leave spyware on my system everytime I visit those sights (and I'm sure there are a zillion other web sites as well.) I run Ad-aware after each time, I visit these, and other unknown websites. Amazing what you find.