Free Firewall

[Past_It]

Can anyone suggest the best Free Firewall? TIA

 

[Eagle Eye]

Can anyone suggest the best Free Firewall? TIA

I use Kerio Personal Firewall 2.1.5

http://www.kerio.com/us/kpf_home.html

 

[Allen_L]

I'll second that recomendation from Eagle Eye...best little firewall of all.
Low resouce, and a lot of options and easy to configure and use. In my
opinion *way* better than Zone Alarm.

....Allen

 

[ozzy]

I'll second that recomendation from Eagle Eye...best little firewall
of all. Low resouce, and a lot of options and easy to configure and
use. In my opinion *way* better than Zone Alarm.

...Allen

I would encourage users looking for firewalls to visit GRC firewall page :
http://grc.com/lt/scoreboard.htm to make a more informed decision. Although
Kerio is new (initial beta Feb 2002) it may well pass the test found at GRC.
Although Allen likes Kerio better than ZoneAlarm, it doesn't dismiss the
fact that ZA is still the #1 firewall used throughout the world. Add to the
fact that there is no documented cases of ZA failing... EVER. Just
remember; FREE is great but not necessarily best ;o)

 

[YK]

I would encourage users looking for firewalls to visit GRC firewall
page : http://grc.com/lt/scoreboard.htm to make a more informed
decision. Although Kerio is new (initial beta Feb 2002) it may well
pass the test found at GRC. Although Allen likes Kerio better than
ZoneAlarm, it doesn't dismiss the fact that ZA is still the #1
firewall used throughout the world. Add to the fact that there is no
documented cases of ZA failing... EVER. Just remember; FREE is
great but not necessarily best ;o)

The review is rather dated but that is what made my decision to go with
Kerio (Tiny.)

The GRC port probe detetector is also good.
https://grc.com/x/ne.dll?bh0bkyd2
http://nanoprobe.grc.com/ <== much more comprehensive tests

 

[Peder]

Can anyone suggest the best Free Firewall? TIA

I first use ZoneAlarm but it was to fuzzy with all the
web noice who is floating around the Internet. I got 5-15
alerts a day. Then a changed over to Sygate Personal Firewall
i have hade only 8 alerts on 1 1/2 month now. So I will say that your
choice must be Sygate Personal Firewall. Atlest try it.

http://smb.sygate.com/buy/download_buy.htm

Find the free personal firewall downest at the page.

/Peder

 

[Mel]

Can anyone suggest the best Free Firewall? TIA

There was an interesting thread

"Bypassing software firewalls"

mention on one of the GRC newsgroups recently

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,7321041~root=security,1~mode=flat

of those tested, apparently only Sygate Personal v5.0
defeated this exploit.

part of the exploit readme
-------------------------
"MBTEST | mbcx8nlp | (e-mail address removed)

MBTEST is designed to test the susceptibility of 'software firewalls'
to being bypassed via low-level packet injection and capture. In cases
where the firewall is able to filter the relevant traffic they can often
be bypassed by packet fragmentation or other means and so we test for
that too.

Please note that this is only a simple demonstration, not a full
evaluation of the technique or your firewall's ability to deal with it.

Eight packets are sent during the test:

1. A TCP packet with the SYN flag set, ports 1024 -> 80
2. The same as 1 but with the IP 'more fragments' bit set
3. The same as 1 but with fragment offset of 8
4. An emtpy IP packet with IP protocol = 50 (ESP)
5. An empty IP packet with IP protocol = 47 (GRE)
6. An ICMP echo request
7. A UDP packet ports 500 -> 500 (ISAKMP)
8. A UDP packet ports 1024 -> 53 (DNS)

 

[JanC]

Add to the fact that there is no documented cases of ZA failing... EVER.

You'd better follow some security lists before you tell things like this...

 

[The Crack Pot]

Can anyone suggest the best Free Firewall? TIA

Yes...

I find that using those cast off used oven bricks and a little creek
clay mixed with sand gives me the best result.

But, then, I may not be building to code.

Happy to help!

-The Crack Pot

 

[ozzy]

There was an interesting thread

"Bypassing software firewalls"

mention on one of the GRC newsgroups recently

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,7321041~root=security,1~mode=flat

of those tested, apparently only Sygate Personal v5.0
defeated this exploit.

part of the exploit readme
-------------------------
"MBTEST | mbcx8nlp | (e-mail address removed)

MBTEST is designed to test the susceptibility of 'software firewalls'
to being bypassed via low-level packet injection and capture. In cases
where the firewall is able to filter the relevant traffic they can
often
be bypassed by packet fragmentation or other means and so we test for
that too.

Please note that this is only a simple demonstration, not a full
evaluation of the technique or your firewall's ability to deal with
it.

Well, unfortunately, that test is BLOCKED by ALL 'good' firewalls listed on
GRC's website when properly used (internet <==> your PC) Go back & read the
CEO's comments. I have tested MBTEST with Kerio & several other 'good'
firewalls & they all pass. Try to give REAL world tests next time NOT
special setup cases. In the real world, we connect to the nasty Internet.

 

[ozzy]

Yes...

I find that using those cast off used oven bricks and a little creek
clay mixed with sand gives me the best result.

But, then, I may not be building to code.

Happy to help!

-The Crack Pot

ROTFLMAO Now that made my day Thanks.

 

[Mel]

Well, unfortunately, that test is BLOCKED by ALL 'good' firewalls listed on
GRC's website when properly used (internet <==> your PC) Go back & read the
CEO's comments. I have tested MBTEST with Kerio & several other 'good'
firewalls & they all pass. Try to give REAL world tests next time NOT
special setup cases. In the real world, we connect to the nasty Internet.

If you are right and this test is totally ineffective for non-trusted networks
then I can't see anything unfortunate about it.

I've yet to test it myself as I hope I made clear - I came across that
thread last night and thought it worth mentioning.

I'm currently using the free version of zonealarm, although I'd actually
prefer to use Sygate or Kerio, but both had issues with my current set-up.

Sygate would be my first choice because I like the UI, logging and
options to capture / view packets.(I'll switch back to Sygate once I get
time to do a clean reinstall of windows - unless a non-beta version of
kerio 4 comes out in the meantime)

 

[WhItE RaBBiT]

I use Kerio Personal Firewall 2.1.5

http://www.kerio.com/us/kpf_home.html

Good, but log functions could still use improvement.

 

[sf]

this...

==> I guess, maybe. there's dozens of complaints about ZA failing in
many NGs.

Binary newsgroups, perhaps? You take your chances when
treading in those waters.

After using ZA for a year, I went w/Outpost. www.agnitum.

I'm not an optimist or a pessimist, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.