Hi all,

I am looking for any recommendation concerning a "mostly portable" firewall meaning :

1) the firewall program would ideally be stored in a single folder
2) all the settings would be stored in a single folder (no setting stored in the registry )
3) the program could be launched by executing a simple .exe file

in order to put in on an usb stick and share it between all my computers.

Thanks in advance.

--
Antoine

if no one suggests a portable solution for you then....

if you have xp use the built in firewall...

"Antoine" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:Xns9812C0FEEF7C1AntoineNews@193.252.117.183...
>
> Hi all,
>
> I am looking for any recommendation concerning a "mostly portable"
> firewall meaning :
>
> 1) the firewall program would ideally be stored in a single folder
> 2) all the settings would be stored in a single folder (no setting stored
> in the registry )
> 3) the program could be launched by executing a simple .exe file
>
> in order to put in on an usb stick and share it between all my computers.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> --
> Antoine

Hello Thorsten,

Thanks for your reply.

> but why should it be portable? If you take it from one system to
> another many settings are useless because they refer to other
> programs (location, version, ...). A firewall is something that
> every system should have itself, not something you should take on
> a trip.

This is a very sensible remark in the general situation.

I tend to use only portable applications. Thus, nearly *all * my applications can be stored on a
movable usb stick. In such a situation, a firewall would ideally be just another portable
application (same remark for an antivirus) and its rules would be defined upon the portable
applications located on the usb stick and not machine-dependant.

The setting of such a firewall would be an "only trusted apps mode" ie :

Applications on the usb stick (+ some windows .dlls) : allowed according to rules
Applications not on the usb stick : denied

> Outpost stores all it's settings in a file within it's folder,
> but I strongly doubt it will work without installation. A
> firewall is something working deeply inside system, there will
> always (?) be some driver/library files, services that need to
> run with windows startup.

OT : I had been providing the official french translation of Outpost(tm) pro for 5 years (and been
rewarded with a free licence of the pro copy) when Agnitum(tm) suddenly stopped, with no
warning and no information, arguing, when I asked, that the translation process needed to be
done by professionals ; the first french pro version translated by these professionals was quite
poor. So, I will definitely never use any Agnitum(tm) product anymore.

--
Antoine

Antoine <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in
news:Xns981378CCC9635AntoineNews@193.252.117.183:

> So, I will definitely never use any Agnitum(tm) product
> anymore.
>

Nose, face, spite, cut!

--
"Audacity, always, audacity"
"Useless eaters"
A government, of the rich, by the rich, and for the rich.
You can fool most of the people, most of the time.

In article <Xns981378CCC9635AntoineNews@193.252.117.183>,
(E-Mail Removed) says...
> This is a very sensible remark in the general situation.
>
> I tend to use only portable applications. Thus, nearly *all * my applications can be stored on a
> movable usb stick. In such a situation, a firewall would ideally be just another portable
> application (same remark for an antivirus) and its rules would be defined upon the portable
> applications located on the usb stick and not machine-dependant.

The major problem with firewalls, as the reply to your OP mentioned is
that for them to be effective, they generally need to be a system level
driver/service. I have never come across one on a modern OS (2K/XP)
that doesn't require some kind of driver install and possible reboot.
It would be very hard to make this portable - maybe possible to install
the service running from the USB stick and remove it after use to
prevent problems for other users of the system but hardly fitting what
seems to be the general definition of portable used by most people.

One alternative would be perhaps to take a small embedded OS with you on
the stick - for example, Damn Small Linux can run in Windows using a
QEMU. This would give you a firewalled and secure/clean web
browser/email combination etc install inside Windows, even if the
Windows install you find yourself using is attacked.

Neither this method nor a firewall would protect you from keyloggers,
which I consider to be more of a problem for users of untrusted machines
- it's all very well bringing your own trusted software, but if every
keystroke you make is logged on that machine for later collection, you
gain nothing by having a firewall available... I would concentrate on
finding portable security tools to ensure the machine you are about to
use is clean, rather than worrying about firewalling it for the short
time you will use it.

HTH

In article <eapdhl$5kf$03$(E-Mail Removed)>,
Thorsten Duhn <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>but why should it be portable? If you take it from one system to
>another many settings are useless because they refer to other
>programs (location, version, ...). A firewall is something that
>every system should have itself, not something you should take on
>a trip.

This is commercial software, so it's semi-OT, but as a demonstration of
concept: there is a product called Kensington Personal Firewall. I've
never used it, and have actually never seen it in a store, so take these
comments with a grain of salt. As described, it is a portable firewall
sold pre-loaded on a USB drive. It is supposed to be plug and play for use
on a machine that isn't your own and has unknown protection (e.g. a kiosk
or public computer).

Ben <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote :

> The major problem with firewalls, as the reply to your OP
> mentioned is that for them to be effective, they generally need to
> be a system level driver/service. I have never come across one on
> a modern OS (2K/XP) that doesn't require some kind of driver
> install and possible reboot. It would be very hard to make this
> portable - maybe possible to install the service running from the
> USB stick and remove it after use to prevent problems for other
> users of the system but hardly fitting what seems to be the
> general definition of portable used by most people.

That is also what I thought but I wanted to be sure there wasn't any portable firewall. Actually, I
could also have asked for a portable antivirus and I guess your answer (low level installation,
driver/service) would also have been right.

> One alternative would be perhaps to take a small embedded OS with
> you on the stick - for example, Damn Small Linux can run in
> Windows using a QEMU. This would give you a firewalled and
> secure/clean web browser/email combination etc install inside
> Windows, even if the Windows install you find yourself using is
> attacked.

That is an idea I hadn't thought of. Thanks ! The "problem" is that many of my portable
applications are internet-dependant : portable firefox (ok, there is a probably a linux based
version), portable thunderbird (ditto) but xnews, screamer-radio, poptray, some seo tools,
etc... are windows-only applications.

> Neither this method nor a firewall would protect you from
> keyloggers, which I consider to be more of a problem for users of
> untrusted machines - it's all very well bringing your own trusted
> software, but if every keystroke you make is logged on that
> machine for later collection, you gain nothing by having a
> firewall available...

Very bright remark, thanks. Actually, my usb-package is first and foremost intended to my
own machines (4) or the corporate ones (2), that is to say relatively trustable machines The
idea behind by initial question was especially to spare time avoiding tuning applications 6
times instead of once.

>I would concentrate on finding portable
> security tools to ensure the machine you are about to use is
> clean, rather than worrying about firewalling it for the short
> time you will use it.

Yes, I think I understand : at least, a kind of "tunnelling all the connections" and ideally have
one's own (small) portable OS so as to avoid keylogging.

> HTH

It does. Many thanks Ben.

--
Antoine

Please read the recent thread about BARTWARE PERSONAL FIREWALL 3.0.2


"Antoine" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:Xns9812C0FEEF7C1AntoineNews@193.252.117.183...
> Hi all,
>
> I am looking for any recommendation concerning a "mostly portable"
> firewall meaning :
>
> 1) the firewall program would ideally be stored in a single folder
> 2) all the settings would be stored in a single folder (no setting stored
> in the registry )
> 3) the program could be launched by executing a simple .exe file
>
> in order to put in on an usb stick and share it between all my computers.
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> --
> Antoine

"John Jay Smith" <1@2.3> wrote :

> Please read the recent thread about BARTWARE PERSONAL FIREWALL
> 3.0.2

Read. Thanks Ken.

--
Antoine