Review Security Diary - Firewall Reviews

[Jose]

For over a year I've gone without a 3rd party software based firewall because I've never felt the need. My routers in the past have done a really great job at advancing my security but what if I didn't have a really great firewall? I'm planning on giving 3 firewalls a chance to prove themselves. I'll run Comodo, ZoneAlarm, and Outpost all for 3 days and review how they take a toll on my computing experience. This will mainly be experience and not number for number performance.

 

I'll start with my good old friend Outpost.

 

Outpost Firewall Pro

Day 1

 

 

When Outpost made their free firewall solution it looks like they forgot about their 64 bit users. I can only share a sigh with my fellow 64 bit users but hope is not lost, we'll instead try their Pro version which does have 64 bit support.

 

Installing Outpost was a very smooth process with an automatic update to insure that your protection would be up to the latest standards. It did require a restart but with a high performance computer it didn't take long.

 

Starting the computer was much rougher then before. Firefox refused to start up and Windows Media Player froze as Outpost began analyzing them. Once turned on, Firefox also had the same reaction as Windows Media Player but fixed itself quickly. Even with all of the analyzing, Outpost turned a blind eye when testing known bad websites were tested. To make things worse, Outpost detected that our fresh trial license had expired a few minutes with in our testing. Day one proved that Outpost just wasn't cutting the cake when it comes to basic security or even trials versions of security software. My early experience with Outpost lead me to instead move on the list.

 

ZoneAlarm

Day 1

 

 

Installing ZoneAlarm was very simple and quick. The installer is actually just a small download client which receives the latest revision from the ZoneAlarm server and installs it. Sadly, ZoneAlarm does require a really annoying toolbar to be installed and does change your homepage. Removing the toolbar is simple but fixing the ZoneAlarm browser modifications does take some looking inside of the configurations files. ZoneAlarm doesn't require a restart and works out of the box which I really liked but for test sakes I restarted anyway.

 

Unlike our first test, ZoneAlarm started quickly and smoothly. It silently began watching over my connection and began asking questions on program permissions. Even with ZoneAlarm on guard, programs did not lag once during our testing and the experience was great. Much like Avira, this program does come with pop up boxes advertising it's paid security suite. Overall for a free program, the ads aren't very bad and the security feels very good.

 

Day 2

After a bit of digging into applications and files, ZoneAlarm began to show how watchful it really was. Constantly the firewall would ask if a connection was safe.  I would of preferred a stealthy firewall but by asking instead, I feel I'm more in control of accepted and rejected connections.

[DarthMenno]

Jose asked me to include my firewall in the reviews!

 

My firewall of choice is Bitdefender Total Security...Wait, that isn't a firewall, why are you talking about it right? Well, actually it comes with a 2 way firewall!

 

Ok, so really, why in the world, would anyone care about firewalls, they block ports, big wup, any software suite can do this, you can download a free firewall, even use windows firewall, and do the same thing, there is really no reason for this.

 

Well, I beg to disagree, let me put it this way, what you stuff your holes with (gigity) matters. If you put cotton balls in their, your going to have leaks, if  you weld steel plates over the ports you have closed, and valves with a sensor to monitor traffic through the holes you have open, gives you a much better idea of what is coming in and out, and why.

 

 

To start, this little gadget is amazing, you can drag and drop it anywhere on your desktop that you like!

 

The top part with the red square tells you there is a critical issue you need to address, really is never critical critical, but could be that it detected you have a weak password, you haven't ran a virus scan in a while, that there is a security flaw in your system, maybe that your java is known to have an exploit and you need to update, or a critical windows update is available, even more rare, is that there was an intrusion attempt detected, or there is an insecure port open.

 

Blue arrows:

 

1. has a light blue bar that goes up and down the space filling as it rises representing bandwidth usage

2. same thing but representing scanner usage, this way you know if it is scanning something, anything outbound or inbound is scanned, and logged. 

3. handy login feature to manage your subscription, and other devices like your android or apple devices, and their locations/security/parental control.

 

The middle part shows you all is good at the moment, but if it has arrows following itself in circles, it can mean it is updating, or scanning. also can be yellow or red if you have serious issues you need to attend, which is rare.

 

 

 

This is a picture of Bitdefender Home!

 

Of course this suite, starts as an antivirus suite, but truly, no standalone antivirus, firewall, encryption tool by itself is good enough. Like Jose uses avira I think he said for malware, he then uses windows firewall for a firewall, and so on. You don't ever just go one and done (gigity) when it comes to security.

 

you see every feature here, one of the cool ones to note is safebox! cloud storage to back up files, never hurts to have more cloud storage, file encryption, which you have bitlocker on your computer that does just fine, you also have a file encryption that comes with bitdefender. and Tuneup!

 

Tuneup comes with a file cleaner, it detects and deletes unimportant cache files pretty much, just like any C cleaner software, you can also defrag a drive using bitdefenders defragmenting software, and has a registry cleaner, and a registry recovery feature.

 

The antispam feature also works with your mail protocols, and logs everything it blocks and you can submit spam to bitdefender cloud that it doesnt block, really great feature.

 

FINALLY SHUT UP JOSH!

 

Firewall!

 

First of all, the firewall is both an inbound and outbound firewall with a basic sniffer that logs everything that is allowed or denied entry, so if you ever need you can go back to the log, see what was allowed, or what wasn't and either make an exception, or not.

 

This is your basic firewall analyzer, you can control any computer on your network, and really cool, you can even control individually your virtual machines, for instance i use vmware, to run some linux programs, I can control traffic from any computer on my network through this feature, if it also has bitdefender installed, which they give you 5 keys to do this when you buy 1 year!

 

 

Now to get a look at the settings! (look at the bitdefender home pic, there is a little settings widget at the top right corner of each feature, click the firewall one to edit settings for the firewall)

 

 

This is where you do the basics, just like any other firewall, add exceptions for applications, adapters, and also your basic rules like block all but what I choose to accept, etc. You can also get to the network monitoring from here. which is the coolest feature below!

 

What security conscious nerd doesn't want to see all of this information continually changing before your eyes!?

 

 

And last but not least, the intrusion detection, as it defines itself above, and some other great features that help you monitor, log, and block.

 

Final note, why monitor, why log? It's probably the most important security feature you can have. Your brain, if you are not logging, and watching, you don't know when something important changes, you won't know when you are missing a file for an important download that your software (bitdefender here) grabbed it and rejected it. It also helps you see when something fishy is happening, because you know what is the norm.

 

This firewall truly is one of the best, especially as a package deal, even when anything gets past, it isn't getting back out. The best part, I never even notice it's existence, never hinders gaming, never hinders browsing, never hinders performance. KUDOS to Bitdefender.

 

(now Jose knows why I swear by it)