I refuse to use torrents because using one allows a hacker to instantly have an IP address with a confirmed probable Widows desktop PC behind it.
Whereas if they scanned IP ranges and passed by mine normally there would be no response at all.
Short of using something as cumbersome as TOR, is there no other way to prevent this happening? I don't want to be the subject of attack. Seems that there is now an even greater incentive to hack someone connected via P2P using this software (to steal their wallet.dat).
I don't think it's a coincidence that the guy who lost half million dollars in bitcoins did. He was probably targeted.
Without a massive-scale timing attack making use of so many nodes that you are connected to every single legitimate node on the network, there is, as far as I am aware, no way to determine how many bitcoins a person with a specific IP address holds.