How to set up a firewall?

Having a telephone is a necessity for most people, even though you will get unwanted calls every now and then. The Internet is also a necessity for many people as well, and it also opens the door to communications that aren’t wanted. Unwanted Internet traffic can be much worse than a telephone solicitor. For this reason, as a first line of defense, you should consider a firewall a necessity.

If you have an always on broadband connection to the net, the chances are that your computer network is being randomly probed on a daily basis by hackers. Once a hacker stumbles on a valid IP (Internet Protocol) address, they will try to exploit vulnerabilities in software or crack passwords in order to gain access to your network.

Similar to a moat that sits around a castle, a firewall can block intruders from gaining access to your computer. Now, let’s take a look at the two basic types of firewalls:

• Hardware firewalls – these firewalls block all traffic that is between the Internet and your network that isn’t explicitly allowed. For example, you may want to configure it only to accept certain kinds of email and web traffic, but to reject all other types. These types of firewalls can also hide the addresses of the computers that are behind your firewall, making individual computers on your network basically invisible to the outside. There may already be a firewall integrated into the router or modem supplied by your ISP (Internet Service Provider). If not, you can purchase an inexpensive hardware router or firewall from companies such as Microsoft, Symantec, and D-Link.
• Software firewalls – Firewalls such as the Microsoft Internet Connection Firewall are built into Windows XP pro, to protect only the computer it’s running on. A good backup defense to hardware firewalls, a software firewalls cannot protect your entire network on its own.

If you are running Windows XP, you can enable a firewall by doing the following:

• Click Start
• Click on the Control Panel
• Double click Network Connections then right click on the connection that you use for Internet access.
• Select Properties, and then click on the Advanced tab
• Select “protect my computer and network by preventing access to the Internet”
• Click OK

If you don’t have Windows XP, you can purchase commercial software from many different places. Zone Alarm is a very good program along with McAfee and Symantec. These firewalls are well known and very well trusted.

Hooking up and configuring a hardware firewall is a very simple procedure. If you need help installing your hardware firewall, we will help you. The firewall itself will connect between the cable/DSL modem and the computers on your network.

Most types of hardware firewalls have a simple web based connection so that you can configure them from your web browser. They are set by default to block all incoming traffic that comes from the Internet, so you must decide what traffic, if any traffic, you want to allow.

It’s always important to remember that a firewall is a first line of defense, and it can’t solve all of your security problems. A firewall can’t protect against the following:

• Malicious traffic that does not travel through the firewall
• Attacks that are initiated after a network has been compromised
• Traffic that travels over legitimate channels
• Many types of viruses