Smurf/broadcast "pings"

[dennisd () PARAGONTECH COM (Dennis DeDonatis)]

When I asked Cisco about my PIX firewall responding to pings to
the broadcast address on its internal and external interfaces, the
following is their response:

>  I do not have your pix configuration attached in the case. If you are
>  atttempting to ping the broadcast address, which is the broadcast for
>  the outside interface of the pix, the pix  outside interface will
>  respond to a broadcast- as will any normal network device. That is
>  the normal behavior of the outside interface of the pix. There is no
>  way to disable this feature at this present time. This is not
>  considered a defect, this is the normal behavior.

Does anyone else see this as a problem to have a security device
act as a SMURF amplifier, or am I just nuts?

Being nuts is a good possibility, but I thought I'd ask you guys
before I assumed I was nuts. :)

Thanks,

Dennis