Re: So much for software firewalls...

From: Kent W. England [MVP] (kwe_at_mvps.org)
Date: 05/16/04 

Date: Sun, 16 May 2004 09:47:49 -0700

Ben M. Schorr wrote:

> On 13 May 2004 14:20, "Kent W. England [MVP]" wrote:
>
>> Can you point me to any firewalls that don't run software?
>
> Kinda depends upon how secure you need it. Here's a basic one:
> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00004SB92/benseverythpages
>
My point is that all firewalls run software and all are vulnerable to
software bugs. Your choice is, basically, between Windows bugs or
Linux/BSD bugs. You might argue that some poor-selling hardware firewall
running some obscure version of BSD would be more secure than the
Windows Internet Connection Firewall, but security through obscurity is
deprecated by the security experts. Cisco/Linksys routers are very
popular and I expect they are closely inspected for bugs by the bad
hackers. It is also the case that you might not watch the web site for
Linksys vulnerabilities whereas with Windows, you can just turn on
Automatic Updates and (sort of) relax. 

-- 
Kent W. England, Microsoft MVP for Windows Security

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