2 software firewalls?

[Syini666]

Just a note on double firewalls, I know for a fact that Agnitum Outpost has problems if either Zone Alarm or Tiny Personal Firewall is also installed, because I had to remove them for outpost to work properly, plus Outpost is nice enough to let you know that it may cause problems if the other two are present

[platte]

I use a hardware firewall and a software firewall. Games however is easy, but i have to put the hardware on dmz for a little while! Games these days seem to use any ports they want!

[drugless]

I have not put this into practice, but it would make an interesting experiment. Essentially, the software firewall acts as a filter -- all traffic flows through it or is blocked by it. If this is true, then the primary firewall (FA) will attempt to block the secondary firewall (FB) on outgoing traffic. Likewise, FB will attempt to block FA on incoming traffic. It seems that in order to work, both would have to trust eachother which in effect would allow holes in one to affect the other.

The end result of this scenario is that there really would be no benefit but lots of overhead. But then again, I could be wrong -- I think I may try some experimentation with Sygate and Zonealarm to see what happens.

[routerboy]

Try using one hardware FW, like a Cable/DSL router/firewall/switch gateway for inbound hardness, th en try Outpost as a PC software firewall for 2nd layer of inbound AND outbound virus/trojan protecting.

[TSR]

Hello Everyone
I'm new to this forum and a new member. Just a quick back ground I work with computers for a living for about 20 years now and I test and evaluate security software. If I may suggest that running 2 firewall's as well as 2 antivirus software at the same time is asking for trouble based on my past experience with them. I have found through testing that there is conflicting issues and false reponse's when running two firewalls at the same time. and these results were documented on my own pc when doing this. As a example you may have 1 firewall configured a certain way with given rules and other firewall a different way. So as if there is a attempt to access your pc they will clash in certain instances. I hope this helps add to your question. Everyone have a great weekend

[Scenicblur]

I think that 2 firewalls works great as long as you have them configured properly. Norton and Zone Alarm Pro work well together and so do Norton and Neolite (if you can find it now!). I've never encountered any probs with either duo.

As to Nitro, I don't think that you should ever shut off your firewall, even if it slows down your gaming. There are so many hackers haunting gaming servers it's unbelieveable!

[Jupes]

I hid this just because the post is looooooong...

A while back in reply to a question on which was the best firewall I wrote this and started a pretty health discussion on some of the problems with two software firewalls.

Originally posted here by Jupes
As for windows firewalls:

I recommend using more than one. Some are better for some things than others. And since there are different approaches to security by firewalls using more than one increases your secutiry. Personally I use VisNetic and ZoneAlarm (and I'm considering adding Sygate). Between them I think I have a high level of intrusion protection.

Originally posted here by instronics
Hi jupes. You said to use more than one firewall on windows? Thats about the one of the biggest mistakes one can do. There are more reasons why this is a bad idea. Let me try to explain the negative sides of what you have proposed.

1 - Two firewalls does not make you more secure. On the opposite, it makes you less secure.

2 - If you setup one firewall "CORRECTLY" then its safe enough, and its easier to administrate. Setting up 2 firewalls will cause you to lack attention on each one individually meaning that you would have 2 poorly setup firewalls which offer no real protetection. Also the thought of having 2 makes you "think" you are safer, which will cause less accuracy.

3 - Two firewalls might interefeer with each other. To maintain a firewall correctly takes some time and accuracy. But to maintain 2 firewalls is madness.

I hope that im making sense to you Jupes.

Cheers.

Originally posted here by Jupes
instronics,

Thanks for the info. I admit I am no firewall jedi and had relied on the suggestions from the book 'Desktop Witness" which I don't have my copy here so I don't know the author. Unless I read it incorrectly (and in that case I don't deserve to have a computer!), it said that it was possible to run more than one firewall.

The book, which covers almost every aspect of securing information on a PC and I found to be excellent, describes extreme measures that can be taken when you have very valuable information (i.e. human rights workers in a totalitarian regieme) but suggests each person takes their own situation into account and only uses the level necessary. I personally don't have a need for such extreme protection but have been experimenting with some of them out of curiosity. I am therefore interested to hear if it is recommended against running more than one firewall?

I have taken some time to configure each firewall to my needs, although I must admit that I have not regularly reviewed VisNetic. What are peoples thought?

Thanks

Originally posted here by instronics
Hi again Jupes. Indeed it is correct that one may run more than one firewall. But i do not think that this is related as in running 2 software firewalls on 1 computer. The word firewall may consist of many different types and kinds. One of these kinds is a simple software firewall. Other kinds consist of 2 routers, a bastion Host, and a proxy server (aka application level firewalls). I think that when you read the part with 2 firewalls it was refered to a network. An example:


<your-client-with-firewall> <----> <internet>

or

<your-client-> <----> <firewall> <-----> <internet>

Where the <firewall> is a dedicated hardware firewall, or just a computer running one.

or a more complex way.

<your-client> <--> <interior-router> <--> <Bastion-Host> <--> <exterior-router> <--> <internet>

Where by the 2 routers in combination with the bastion host are 1 large firewall setup

or what i think you meant

<your-client-with-firewall> <----> <firewall> <----> <internet>


As you see there are many things called firewall. To run 2 software firewalls of one computer is nonsense. If you would like a deeper insight on firewalling (which by the way is a very good and interesting read) then i would recomend a book called "Building internet firewalls 2nd edition" by Oreilly www.oreilly.com .

Thats a great book which will cover *nix aswell as windows systems. Do not let the size or the price of the book scare you, its an excellent read.

Good luck

Cheers.

[dac0braman]

could anyone reccomend me a good freebie firewall

[Darken_Binary]

I have had the best luck with running a hardware firewall on a router and a single software firewall. Not only do two software firewalls use up more resources (not really an issue if you are running a CPU over 2 gig) they can conflict with each other, you have to configure them to not block each other, and sometimes they just don't like each other. Also alot of the time you end up setting permissions twice as many time for programs to access the network. Which was a pet peave of mine when I tryed dual software firewalls once. Hardware firewalls do not use any resources on your pc and they are as configurable if not even more configurable then most software firewalls (most use a web-interface for you to set it up). Also you get the extra benefits of the router. You can pick up a two port cable/dsl router for usually less than 40 dollars, which is as cheap as most software firewalls ( i know some are free). Also almost any hacker who can get through Norton will have no trouble with Zone or Sygate or vise versa, so in reality all you are doing is slowing them down a little, but prolly not much. Also if you have a broadband connection, disconnect when you aren't at your comp. Why leave the door open if you don't want anyone coming in ?

[TheFiend]

If you use Macfee firewall, you have to uninstall Zone alarm pro, so if your buying these, dont buy these two like i did, you cant use both, thankfully i still got to play with them though there both fairly good walls