What is a Firewall?

Answer:

A firewall is a system that is designed to prevent unauthorized access to or from a private network. All communication between your computer and internet flows through the firewall since it lies between your computer network and the Internet.

A firewall can be software or hardware.

Hardware firewalls provide higher level of security and hence preferred for servers where security has the top most priority. The software firewalls are less expensive and hence preferred in home computers and laptops.

Hardware firewalls usually come as an in-built unit of a router and provide maximum security by filtering the data at packet-level.

 

Question:

Why do we need a firewall?

Answer:

Internet connection leaves you vulnerable to hackers who want to access your financial and personal information. Some hackers may be after your high-speed connection so that they can send malicious viruses and worms, blackening your reputation. Other intruders have the power to destroy your operating system on a whim.

A firewall works as a barrier, or a shield, between your computer network and internet. When you are connected to the Internet, you are constantly sending and receiving information. All messages entering or leaving the intranet pass through the firewall, which examines each message and blocks those that do not meet the specified security criteria.

Firewalls provide security over a number of online threats such as Ransomware, Remote login, Trojan backdoors, Session hijacking, DOS & DDOS attacks, viruses, cookie stealing and many more.

 

Question:

What are the advantages of having a Firewall and how it can be implemented in a network?

Answer:

A traditional firewall uses packet filtering to examine the header of a packet to determine its source and destination. This information is compared against a set of rules to determine whether the packet is to be forwarded or dropped.

Next Generation firewalls are designed to filter network and Internet traffic based upon the applications or traffic types using specific ports.

The application-specific granular security policies provided by Next Generation Firewalls help them detect application-specific attacks, giving them the potential to catch more malicious activity than more traditional firewalls.

Fortinet / Zyxel / Draytek Firewalls provide a comprehensive layer of defense by combining gateway content filtering, anti-spam, anti-virus, anti-spyware, intrusion prevention, and regain visibility into the network through application intelligence and visualization.

Firewalls are usually placed between your computer network and Internet.

A solid firewall will help you stop intruders from accessing your system. You keep your internet link to the outside world but the outside world can’t view you unless you want them to.

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