socket security

[Paul Rubin]

Alastair Nicol <calaban.madness at blueyonder.co.uk> writes:
> 1) Can only hosts which can see the interface your program is bound to 
> communicate with your program. In the "normal" case if you bind to 
> 127.0.0.1 for example ONLY your machine can see that interface. Other 
> machines cannot connect to it. Is this a safe / secure assumtion? (not just 
> for localhost)

Normally yes; however, if your app is strictly local and you're
running a *nix system, you may prefer using AF_UNIX (unix domain
socket) instead of an IP socket.  That avoids the whole TCP stack etc.