What's the best firewall?

[Sunil]

sniff, if only it were that easy for me, i just cant make up my mind..i had

been using sygate but then i changed to zonealarm.

i cant make up my mind, i just cant

im testing outpost now, i like the feature set. But im off to kerio.....

[purewaveform]

It has only been mentioned once, but the stuff from Jetico, is awesome! http://www.jetico.com/jpfirewall.htm it is a little technical, and can redirect packets etc as well. It also has all the layers of support, by application, ip, port, time etc. It also takes up very little resources. It is worth the time you spend with it. and as a side note the complete setup and configuration can be automated, so that it can be made unattended. try it.

[kurt476]

i say windows xp firewall is enugh for me

[mtvento]

Nvidia hardware firewall (but you need the right mobo)

and Norton Internet security suite is just fine

[un4given1]

I'm not a big fan of software firewalls. I would say you are best off having a hardware firewall. A stateful firewall is best.

[Carmon]

Iam probly a Hackers Dream cuz i dont use one tbh only one i have is xp one i dont see the point cuz i neva use any personal or credit details or any information that i need to hide

[phex]

Now I'm trying a free firewall called Smoothwall, and it seems be OK (I got a very old PIII 550 128 MB RAM 8 GB HDD).

www.smoothwall.org

[Fridge-RaideR]

"and it seems be OK" yeh coss the chance u get attack in 1 on 100.000

I got a router with the firewall disabled, but to get through a router u have to know quite some things, n if u know that, ur not gonna attack people at home but companies...

I think firewalls on homepc's like mine are pointless

[Gantlett]

I use Sygate Personal Firewall Pro and I'm extremely happy with it. NEVER crashes, uses very little system resources (you never feel it's there) and works flawlessly. The GUI isn't the best I've seen, but you only need to deal with it upon initial setup and after you're done with that you never have to touch it again. I also recommend ZoneAlarm Free - just as good (better GUI but I think takes a little more resources - I'll stay with Sygate then ) .

For great system security and performance I recommend using Sygate and Grisoft AVG Free antivirus together. AVG Free is the only Antivirus that doesn't slow down your computer. ALL THE OTHERS DO !

[unosys]

AVG Free is the only Antivirus that doesn't slow down your computer. ALL THE OTHERS DO !

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

This table shows the number of occasions since 2003 that various AV products have received a perfect score from Virus Bulletin newsletter's monthly tests.

NOD32 10/10 100%

Norton 9/9 100%

F-Secure 9/9 100%

Trend 8/8 100%

Kaspersky 9/11 82%

McAfee 8/10 80%

AVG 6/8 75%

Norman 7/10 70%

F-Prot 6/9 67%

Avast 6/9 67%

I use NOD32..it's so low on resources that you actually forget the fact that you are running a antivirus & is currently the best as the table above indicates. Well just try it and i assure you that u will not even think of other choices!

[Fridge-RaideR]

nod32 got the most awards overal, but the last month kaspersky came out best according to wildvirus capturing tests (the scanners had to get the virus without it being n their database) anyway... keep antivirus in the antivirus thread

[JoeMSFN]

I vote hardware/dedicated 2 nic PC firewall is the best for blocking unrequested/uninitiated incoming traffic.

But for programs that like to "phone home" a software/personal firewall running on the workstation computer seems like the only way. Afterall, you can't just block outgoing port 80 at the main firewall, and I'm not aware of anyway for a dedicated firewall to know what PROGRAM generated the outgoing request. I can't say if ZA is the best, but I did see it block an outgoing request from a program called "Klez" .

The only request I make (not sure if it's possible to implement) is when "Generic Service Something" wants to make an outgoing connection, that it tell me what program or service or whatever attached itself to the Generic handler/method/whatever to make the request.

One last thing. Just for personal enlightenment, try a personal firewall and just see how much stuff wants to access the internet (at least on 2k or XP)!! I found it quite shocking.

[DiGGiTY]

For business CheckPoint in failover config running on Nokia's

For personal, Windoze firewall... Throw Spybot and Ad-Aware in there and you're all good

[Fridge-RaideR]

ur not really a hacker r u.. recommending windows firewall :/

where r the ip traceback programs u should recommend? or advanced portcheckers/closers

[EchoNoise]

*cough* linux *cough*

But seriously, I don't mind hardware firewalls, but if you can't spend the money, just pop in a small linux-based firewall with iptables...

I can see myself getting flamed for this comment... haha !