What is a firewall

Every organization faced this- network security as a challenge.  Network security, as we know, means protection of networks and it includes crucial connections such as devices, technologies and others. Without this, processes can’t deliver desired results as the functioning would always be challenged with some or other network risks.

One of the systems that ensure this security is firewall. Many users confuse between firewall and antivirus; while both ensure security of the system, there is a big fundamental difference between the two. While firewall filters data packets, the antivirus software helps identify and rectify any errors that could lead to network attacks. If a user wants their process to run efficiently, they should have both antivirus and firewall installed in the system.

Today, we’d discuss about firewall and how it is necessary for a system:

What is firewall?

what is firewall
Source: Geekflare

It is network security helping to monitor the network traffic- it can be both the outgoing and the ingoing one. Watching over the traffic leads to tracking whether traffic getting into the system is of worth or not. It means the moment there is an odd activity; the firewall is alerted.

The firewall can be both the software or hardware and its main purpose is to stop unauthorized user from accessing into the computer network. All these works based on a set of rules, ensuring the process is on a streamlined path.

Firewall, you can say, acts as a barrier and protects network from any malicious activities that could lead to losses for organization. It filters out any such activities. The different firewalls are a proxy firewall where it does the inspection at packet of application layer. The next is packet filtering firewall where the system examines all packets in complete isolation. Then you have the next generation firewall that uses a multi-layered approach for integrating different capabilities. Last but not least, you have stateful inspection firewall for determining whether one packet is related to another. Among all these firewalls, the next-generation firewall is considered to be the most useful one aligned with processes. One should know that operating system and the security software you use is available to you with a pre-installed firewall making it easy for the user.

How do you define a VPN firewall?

A virtual private network firewall is a device that tracks malicious users for misusing the VPN connection. This VPN firewall is known to be installed at the server end of virtual private network.

The other thing to note is this firewall can be an all-in-one firewall appliance meaning both the hardware or software.

What affects a firewall?

The things that can affect a firewall are insider attacks, malware, distributed denial of service attacks, patching and configuration. These challenges come in path of firewall, sometimes leading to disruption in the working process. The foundation to a good firewall is VPN, perimeter router, IDS, and others.

There are different types of firewall software in the market such as Comodo Firewall, Netdefender, AVS firewall, PeerBlock and many more to help organizations ensure right success for their process.

How do a firewall work?

It implements a policy among the networks. What it means is the policy has different options such as switch with virtual local area network, packet filtering router and others. The packet filtering lets in crucial action where packets that attempts to enter network are executed against filters. This makes a hindrance path. The different hardware and software firewalls work in varied ways.

The hardware firewalls base is built on network devices. Now these network devices include routers, and others; the important thing about this firewall is that it requires almost nil configuration. The hardware firewalls use filtering techniques for understanding whether it has to leave the packet or take it to the destination. The software firewalls are mainly designed for personal use or at the home services. They help protect against any applications or other malicious applications.

Some of the high-end uses are that these firewalls can be incorporated into both consumer as well as different business corporate scenarios.

What are the advantages of firewall?

  • It gives priority to privacy
  • It continuously looks over the network traffic
  • It significantly prevents the hacking process
  • The system monitors log sessions between two networks
  • It helps in concentrated security
  • In policy enforcement

Are there any disadvantages of firewall?

  • It increases the costs
  • It leads to complex operations
  • It can consume more random-access memory resources
  • It can thus decrease the performance

Conclusion:

The modern times seek modern solutions for complex challenges. When you have that, you are ensured to reach the pinnacle of success.

With securities concerns engulfing many organizations, firewall is a necessity in an organization. The hardware or the software acts as a security guard blocking any suspicious actions. Thus, it gives a peace of mind to organizations and further the concerned person could focus on other tasks. We all are aware of many security breaches in recent times, where cybercriminals gain access to confidential data and mostly this happens due to loopholes in system. The firewall is one of the steps that mitigate the chances of any such risks. It leads the best path to protect network system.

 

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *