"Juergen Nieveler" <juergen.nieveler.nospam@arcor.de> wrote in message
news:Xns9638D3EA322CFjuergennieveler@nieveler.org. ..
> "Mosseem" <mossaddress@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Our IT guy came and added something to my computer. He went to
>> add/remove > add windows components > management & monitoring tools
>> >
>> simple network management protocol. This is listed as "agents that
>> monitor the activity in network devices and report to the network
>> console workstation."
>
> SNMP is used to monitor certain hardware parameters, like network
> bandwidth, CPU load etc. - it all depends on what kind of device you
> want to monitor, really, there's printers that can tell you the
> number
> of printed pages, and even a (tongue-in-cheek) protocol to check
> coffee
> machines over the network using SNMP.

The world's first webcam was pointed at the Trojan room coffee pot at
the computer science department of Cambridge University. The purpose
was to avoid pointless trips to the coffee room by people working in
other parts of the building by providing a live picture of the state
of the coffee pot. The camera was installed on a local network in 1991
using a video capture card on an Acorn Archimedes. Using the X Window
System protocol, Quentin Stafford-Fraser wrote the client and Paul
Jardetzky wrote the server. The camera was connected to the Internet
in 1993 by Daniel Gordon and Martyn Johnson. At 0954 UTC on August 22,
2001 the camera was finally switched off and the pot (actually the
fourth or fifth seen on-line) was auctioned on eBay for £3350.


cmsix

>
> It's NOT a privacy threat, though - the worst the admin can see
> using
> SNMP is how full your local harddrive is. Using normal admin rights
> he
> can even see the contents of your harddrive, so no need to worry :-)
>
> Juergen Nieveler
> --
> W.I.N.D.O.W.S - Will Install Necessary Drivers, Or Won't Start.