That’s the answer for all the security problems in the world !!!

Or was it 42? yeah 42… and then definitely firewall. Yeah, I’m sure of that.

Wait a minute – 42 is only the meaning of life… than definitely firewall is the only answer.

Ok ok, let me explain. In the past couple of years, Windows users received a built-in firewall by Microsoft (finally). Now many questions and comments I hear, read and see are “but I have a firewall …”.

Lets make some things clear. Firewall is a good thing, but its entire purpose in life is to filter packets. It does so by following sets of rules and instructions, and if it does not know what do with a certain communication, well, than it depends on the firewall – it will either block anything that it does not know about, or pass the communication.

Firewalls are only good for managing connections. It’s like a policeman that direct traffic on a junction that is very busy. It can stop it, move it to different location, or just let it flow. It’s good, when you know how to use it, but it’s not the answer for DoS attacks (good, expensive firewalls may have also some type of load balancing, but thats not what most of us expect from it).

Firewalls do not protect you from malicious content ! It is not even an Intrusion Prevention Server (IPS), and lets remember that even an IPS does not act as an IPS (but lets not return to that argument again).

An attacker can still attack you just as easy as before, only when you have firewall, it will block traffic that you know you do not like or wish to see.

So the next time I hear “but I have a firewall, why did XYZ happen?”, I’ll take off, FAST…