Hi,
front door for a mainframe telnet session, is there any valid reason to even install telnet, rlogin, etc.?
Yes, if you need to update ssh remotly. sshd got a lot of security problems the last years, if you have to update it remotly you will enable telnetd for a short period to restart sshd after an update - if the update fails you will be locked out of a remote system :-) Anyway you should consider to use pam features to secure the login (via sshd and telnet): disable remote root login, limit the su command then to few selected users with the pam listfile module. Nearly all script kiddies will fail to use a rootkit, even if they get it installed, as they are not able to add a user to the arbitrary listfile. That saved my servers once... You should upgrade to the latest SuSE Version anyway, obsolete products become really difficult after a short time (as you have to upgrade everything from sources manually). Good luck, Dieter