iMac Hosting Security

I apologise in advance if this has been answered before - just point me in the right direction, I didn't find anything with the search.

I'm going to host a website, for a short while, on my iMac - if I decide I like it, I'll get proper hosting, I am not a nutter and I don't intend to use my personal computer as a server indefinitely.

On the plus side, I work in finance for a broadband provider, so I get fairly good, fairly cheap broadband at home, so it's no problem to host it from here - the bandwidth (512k upstream) is fine for a fledgling website with no more than a few readers, and I have no usage limits. I can up the speed to 1-meg upstream at very little cost if necessary.

Apache's up and running, PHP works, MySql's copasetic, the website is live, everything's hunky-dory.

But I'm loathe to publicise the URL to potential audiences until I've secured the box itself, and I have no idea how to do this. I don't know what the potential security risks are, I don't know how to secure a box against attackers other than in the most rudimentary way, and I don' t know just how worried I should be about all that.

Any advice, pointers, directions or suggestions as to what I should be reading or sites I should be visiting to get smart on this?

Many thanks.

Nicolas.

I would take a look here: http://www.apple.com/server/resources/

well if you really want to publish your site onto the web using your mac, probably the best way for now is the classic way: close every ports and every services on your mac, leaving the HTTP service/port the only open one.

that should leave your HTTP the only hole opened on your Mac, and the PHP security should be able to manage it. just try to get some enlightment from Unca Google...

Batten down the hatches

So batten down the hatches and watch the system and apache logs like a hawk?

What is the world coming to when you have to be paranoid when hosting a website? Sad state of affairs if you ask me.

Thanks for the help.