Firewall

Introduction
 The Internet has made large amount of information available to the average
computer user at home, in business and education.
 For many people, having access to this information is no longer just an advantage; it
is essential.
 Therefore, security of network is the main criteria here and firewalls provide this
security.
 What is a Firewall?
 A Firewall is simply a program or hardware device that filters the information
coming through the internet connection into your private network or
computer system.
 What is an application firewall?
 An application firewall is a special firewall that is specifically coded for the type
of traffic it is inspecting.

 The most widely developed application firewall is the web application firewall.
 What is the difference between a host-based firewall and a network-based
firewall?

 A host-based firewall is installed on an individual computer to protect it from

activity occurring on its network.

 A network-based firewall is implemented at a specified point in the network path and

protects all computers on the “internal” side of the firewall from all computers on the
“external” side of the firewall.
 Hardware firewall vs Software firewall
 Hardware firewalls are integrated into the router that sits between a computer
and the Internet.

 Software firewalls are installed on individual servers. They intercept each connection
request and then determine whether the request is valid or not.
 History of Firewalls
 Firewall technology first began to emerge in the late 1980s. Internet was still a
fairly new technology in terms of its global usage and connectivity.

 In 1988 an employee at the NASA Ames Research Center in California sent a memo
by email to his colleagues that read, "We are currently under attack from an Internet
VIRUS!

 The first paper published on firewall technology was in 1988, when Jeff Mogul from
Digital Equipment Corp. developed filter systems know as packet filter firewalls.

 One of the largest internet security companies in the world released the product
to the public in 1997.
 Design Goals for a Firewall
 The first design goal for a firewall is that collectively the sum of all the
network traffic from internal to external must go through the firewall
physically cutting off all access to the local network except via the
firewall.
 The second design goal would be only authorized traffic which is
delineated by the local security policy will be allowed to proceed.
 Finally the last design goal is that the firewall itself is resistant to
penetration inclusive is a solid trustworthy system with a protected
operating system.
 Types of firewalls
 Packet-filtering Router
 Packet-filtering Router
 Applies a set of rules to each incoming IP packet and then forwards or
discards the packet
 Filter packets going in both directions
 The packet filter is typically set up as a list of rules based on matches to fields in
the IP or TCPheader
 Two default policies (discard or forward)
 Types of firewalls…
 Application-level Gateway
 Application-level Gateway
 Also called proxy server
 Acts as a relay of application-level traffic
 Types of firewalls…
 Circuit-level Gateway
 Circuit-level Gateway
 Stand-alone system or
 Specialized function performed by anApplication-level Gateway
 Sets up two TCP connections
 The gateway typically relays TCP segments from one
connection to the other without examining the contents
 The security function consists of determining which connections will
be allowed
 Basic concepts of a firewall
 Source
 Destination
 Service
 Action
 The Role of Firewalls

 A firewall is a term used for a ``barrier'' between a network of machines and users that
operate under a common security policy and generally trust each other, and the outside
world.
 There are two basic reasons for using a firewall at present: to save money in
concentrating your security on a small number of components, and to simplify the
architecture of a system by restricting access only to machines that trust each other.
 Advantages of firewall
 Concentration of security all modified software and logging is located on the firewall
system as opposed to being distributed on many hosts;

 Protocol filtering, where the firewall filters protocols and services that are either not
necessary or that cannot be adequately secured from exploitation;

 Information hiding, in which a firewall can ``hide'' names of internal systems or

electronic mail addresses, thereby revealing less information to outside hosts;

 Application gateways, where the firewall requires inside or outside users to connect
first to the firewall before connecting further, thereby filtering the protocol;
 Disadvantages of firewall
 The most obvious being that certain types of network access may be hampered or even
blocked for some hosts, including telnet, ftp, X Windows, NFS, NIS, etc.

 A second disadvantage with a firewall system is that it concentrates security in

one spot as opposed to distributing it among systems, thus a compromise of the
firewall could be disastrous to other less-protected systems on the subnet.
 Conclusion
 One of the best things about a firewall from a security standpoint is that it stops anyone
on the outside from logging onto a computer in your private network.

 While this is a big deal for businesses, most home networks will probably not be
threatened in this manner. Still, putting a firewall in place provides some peace of mind.