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Firewalls
1. Explain in detail software and hardware firewalls
2. I have a lynksys router with both wired and wireless access, I know that 192.xxx.xxx.xxx address is not routable from the net so do I need both software and a hardware firewall.
2. I have a lynksys router with both wired and wireless access, I know that 192.xxx.xxx.xxx address is not routable from the net so do I need both software and a hardware firewall.
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Thats very good info by petelong.....To put in simple words..It depends which device you need..depends on your requirements..but in your case i dont think so you need a Hardware firewall...LinkSys does have a builtin NAT..(PeteLong is absolutely correct) :)
Hi all,
actually i think it is a syntactical mistake to differ between hardware & software firewalls, as it is always the software which does the job...
Further on, a firewall itself is neither a piece of hardware, nor a piece of software; it's more like a concept.
The so-called "software firewalls" like ZoneAlarm IMHO are not able to do the promised job by design - it's software running in the user space like every other piece of software (including malicious one) and therefore can be controlled by malicious code.
Some people consider personal firewalls as "snake oil" for that reason...
PeteLong,
>linksys routers usually come with a simplt firewall built in (based on Zone Alarm - check your documentation)
todays linksys routers (at least the WLAN-capable ones) are mainly based on Linux / netfilter (in fact, that's applicable to nearly all consumer WLAN-routers). Due to the GPL and its enforcement by several preliminary injunctions settled against some manufacturers by the netfilter core team, the source code is freely available, so you even can put your own linux distros on those devices. --> http://www.openwrt.org
Pretty nifty, as you can get a whole bunch of functionality on a 70$-device (including e.g. IPSec, PPTP, DNS-server, NTP-server,...)...
Cheers,
-XoF-
actually i think it is a syntactical mistake to differ between hardware & software firewalls, as it is always the software which does the job...
Further on, a firewall itself is neither a piece of hardware, nor a piece of software; it's more like a concept.
The so-called "software firewalls" like ZoneAlarm IMHO are not able to do the promised job by design - it's software running in the user space like every other piece of software (including malicious one) and therefore can be controlled by malicious code.
Some people consider personal firewalls as "snake oil" for that reason...
PeteLong,
>linksys routers usually come with a simplt firewall built in (based on Zone Alarm - check your documentation)
todays linksys routers (at least the WLAN-capable ones) are mainly based on Linux / netfilter (in fact, that's applicable to nearly all consumer WLAN-routers). Due to the GPL and its enforcement by several preliminary injunctions settled against some manufacturers by the netfilter core team, the source code is freely available, so you even can put your own linux distros on those devices. --> http://www.openwrt.org
Pretty nifty, as you can get a whole bunch of functionality on a 70$-device (including e.g. IPSec, PPTP, DNS-server, NTP-server,...)...
Cheers,
-XoF-
ThanQ
Imm willing to bet the Linksys is doing NAT (network address translation) thats converting all the 192.168.0.x addresses you are using internally to the Public address that your ISP has given to you - linksys routers usually come with a simplt firewall built in (based on Zone Alarm - check your documentation) or log into it and have a dig around usually http://192.168.0.1 will get you there and admin with a blank password (or admin again) gets you in unless you reset it.
I still use software firewalls on my clients PC's (I have a linksys too) I prefer Zone Alarm Pro but there are others