I have a firewall myself and look at the logs on a semi-daily basis. Several times a day, every day that it's on and connected, my machine gets hit by somebody trying to cast or activate a trojan, by somebody trying to do back orifice, by somebody just pinging me for exposed ports (I've got them all default "off" of course), or by somebody sending an incomplete IP in hopes of getting some response (a form of pinging). If I happen to go onto IRC, regardless of what channel I get onto, the frequency of assault goes WAAAAAYYYYYY up. Merely being online and having an IP address is enough to get hit. IRC is a bus station with bad lighting and lots of winding hallways from any location to any other location--mugger heaven. Unfortunately, nobody is willing to purchase my Ultimate Computer Security Package. It consists of encasing your computer in a pour of concrete and dropping it down a mine shaft.