Are firewalls really needed?

[malexous]

Are you also using Sandboxie as your signature indicates?

~Maxx~
.

Yes.

 

[CarlTR6]

Max, I was using Comodo until I discovered that Comodo sends information about the user's surfing to a third party. Maybe they don't do that any more; but I dropped Comodo.

 

[stormy13]

And then you have ZoneAlarm doing moronic things like this,

ZoneAlarm Global Virus Alert About ZeuS.Zbot.aoaq, Scareware At Its Best

 

[Hopalong X]

Zone Alarm!
It used to be one of the best but has gone to junk after they changed ownership a couple of years back.

 

[CarlTR6]

Do any of the Members who are reading this thread have any constructive comments and solutions regarding the use of a software Firewall to enhance the prevention of programs sending personal information they have gathered in our Win 7 computers out to the internet as so many of todays freeware programs have been instructed to do?

~Maxx~
.

Do any of the Members who are reading this thread have any constructive comments and solutions regarding the use of a software Firewall to enhance the prevention of programs sending personal information they have gathered in our Win 7 computers out to the internet as so many of todays freeware programs have been instructed to do?

~Maxx~
.

@ Maxx i have used Comodo Firewall & Windows Firewall...i found Comodo much better then Windows though Comodo keep telling you at every stage while installing a software (changing system files,registry) which i found great but as @ jav said most of non-tech user won't know whats happening & while simply accept everything which might lead a virus enter the network...Windows Firewall is as well great but it allowed a virus without my knowledge & after a reboot i couldn't log in :shock: & then i have to do the repair to get things going for me ...i don't know how that happened ...but i agree with both u & jav but would like to tell you that i'm not using any Firewall & there are many people like me who are not using any firewall...i'm not saying that 1 shouldn't but like u 2 i'll say every1 should use a firewall if its 2 way then great!!!

And then you have ZoneAlarm doing moronic things like this,

ZoneAlarm Global Virus Alert About ZeuS.Zbot.aoaq, Scareware At Its Best

Zone Alarm!
It used to be one of the best but has gone to junk after they changed ownership a couple of years back.

And ZA flat does not work on most Win 7 systems. It is an almost guaranteed cause of BSOD's.

 

[Hopalong X]

I dumped ZA months ago on my XP.

Good info to now it isn't compatible with Win7.
Mike

 

[Keiichi25]

Well, here's the funny thing...

ZoneAlarm is now owned by Checkpoint Systems. I used to work with Checkpoint FW-1 product as it was required by our parent company at the last place I worked at.

Checkpoint is pretty darn expensive, and had some limitations, like I couldn't setup domains for web allowances, so for controlling user's internet browsing habits, we had to use ISA server and force proxy settings to make it happen.

ZoneAlarm itself, the few times I had to deal with it, I found it to be a bit restrictive and sometimes a little overbearing, especially when setting up VPN connections, ironically, this was for a user trying to setup a VPN connection to Checkpoint.

As for the recent article, I heard about that today on one of my readers and just shook my head. It is one of the things I normally criticize some of my users not to do, since the malware stuff does the same thing to trick people into doing something they shouldn't.

 

[Maxxwire]

Max, I was using Comodo until I discovered that Comodo sends information about the user's surfing to a third party. Maybe they don't do that any more; but I dropped Comodo.

Do you have documentation of this? From what I read there were some vague comments about Comodo's EULA which contains the same kind of legal jargon that MS has in their EULA only much milder about collecting user information and now the rumor has turned into these as yet undocumented accusations.

People need to wake op and realize who the real information gathering and dissemination enemy is. Most people have no idea that Google shares their information with everyone on the list of results that they get from them that's why I recommend using the Scroogle Scraper for truly anonymous and encrypted delivery of search engine results.

I try the best I can to be security conscious and this is why I am very interested in any documentation that you have about Comodo selling user information because it wouldn't be right to act on hearsay.

~Maxx~
.

 

[mickey megabyte]

have a look here and here for example - i only did a quick google - it's quite funny really, if true.

 

[Lemur]

Zone Alarm!
It used to be one of the best but has gone to junk after they changed ownership a couple of years back.

I agree. I won't touch ZA now.

 

[Maxxwire]

have a look here and here for example - i only did a quick google - it's quite funny really, if true.

I see. As far as I know and have read the criticism leveled at Comodo's EULA can be leveled at most any software's EULA. Microsoft has an even more privacy invasive EULA and has openly pre-scheduled programs that send data to Redmond each and every day that the computer is in use and yet that does not prevent people from using Windows 7 which has a level of comprehensive data retrieval that did not even exist in previous versions of Windows, but the Comodo Firewall can be programmed to block all of MS's attempts to extract data from your computer on a daily basis.

~Maxx~
.

 

[Hopalong X]

mickey megabyte

Clicked the first link. I loved their moderators response at the bottom of the page.

US Congress question to Chairman of BP- "Did BP cause the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico?"

BP Chairman- "No I don't play golf I enjoy yachting. I don't do the cooking so I don't know what oil the chef uses."

Hmmmm??????:sarc:
Something got lost in the legal translation I beleive.

 

[CarlTR6]

Max, I was using Comodo until I discovered that Comodo sends information about the user's surfing to a third party. Maybe they don't do that any more; but I dropped Comodo.

Do you have documentation of this? From what I read there were some vague comments about Comodo's EULA which contains the same kind of legal jargon that MS has in their EULA only much milder about collecting user information and now the rumor has turned into these as yet undocumented accusations.

People need to wake op and realize who the real information gathering and dissemination enemy is. Most people have no idea that Google shares their information with everyone on the list of results that they get from them that's why I recommend using the Scroogle Scraper for truly anonymous and encrypted delivery of search engine results.

I try the best I can to be security conscious and this is why I am very interested in any documentation that you have about Comodo selling user information because it wouldn't be right to act on hearsay.

~Maxx~
.

Max, I will see if I can find the link. It was posted on one of the security forums. I looked it up at the time. I also think one of the security experts posted here also.

 

[Maxxwire]

CarlTR6- I remember the controversy that you are referring to. Digging into the EULA of any software can lead to all sorts of wild speculations. There is a lot of ruthless completion in the world of computer security but I think its best to focus on what the software can do rather than to try to twist some legal jargon into something potentially incriminating. I value an honest set of side by side tests any day with the freedom to choose the best protection over gossip and speculation about the contents of the respective product's EULA because even the best sounding and eloquently written EULA will not protect your computer...

~Maxx~
.

 

[deepakumar]

i never touched or gave a thought about ZA because even our company listed it as a threat for computer security & personal information being shared. Thank you CarlTR6 & its good to know that it isn't compatible with Win 7 or else many more would have fall in the pit.

 

[Maxxwire]

I've spoken with people who were using ZA about 7-8 years ago and according to them it was THE computer security software to have back in 2002.

~Maxx~
.

 

[deepakumar]

Maxx i got my Comodo firewall 5.0...can you help me with HIPS settings??? is it 'define a new application' under firewall option???i clicked on it & did set 'all applications'...

 

[Maxxwire]

deepakumar- Congratulations on your new state of the art multi-layered default deny computer security software! Make sure to do a full scan to make sure that your computer is clean before setting up HIPS.

Comodo makes using HIPS easy if you first in the GUI go into Defense+> Advanced> Defense+ Settings and set it to Training Mode and then one by one start all of the programs that you use and HIPS will learn all of your trusted programs. When you are finished return Defense+ to Safe Mode and it will notify you of any unauthorized code executions on the desktop.

If you set the Comodo Firewall in Custom Policy Mode in the GUI Firewall> Advanced> Firewall Behavior Settings it will alert you each time a program requests to access the internet and you can then choose to allow or block the request which will establish your Firewall Rules.

If you have any more questions please feel free to ask.

~Maxx~
.

 

[antares]

Maxx, do you regularly check with ShieldsUP site to make sure that all ports are stealth? As you start using all programs,and manually set the policy rules you never occasionally have a closed port (blue) instead of stealth (all green)? I tested both Norton Internet Security (versions 2008 through 2011) and Comodo Firewall and it happens with both. The solution I found is to do a firewall reset when this happens which among other things deletes all policy rules prompting me to rebuild them again. But eventually it happens again, can't seem to find a permanent fix to this.

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
to OP

YES - but hardware or software or a combination of both -- over to you.

I tend to prefer Hardware firewall protection with some minimal software solutions since all my surfing is via a Virtual Macine and NOTHING but NOTHING gets transferred to my REAL hardware until its been properly checked out.

If I get any Virus problems I just restore the Virtual machine -- like they say in those UK Meerkat commercials --SEEEMPLES.

However getting a decent HARDWARE firewall in a router is not that easy -- you need to get a commercial quality router. Most Home routers are fairly basic in this but they do provide decent logging.

Cheers
jimbo