Basic question about using a router with LnS

Hi

I've just got me self a router so can go wireless with my laptop, as well as my main pc being hardwired to the router. The SMC router has nat/spi, hacker logs etc.

I've seen the sticky about configuring LnS with a router, but a more basic question: do I now need to use the internet filtering on LnS? And therefore only use the application filtering? If I do this, I would be assuming I have properly set up the h/w router correctly

Or if do use the internet filtering, is this now a secondary line of defence if a hacker gets past the h/w firewall? And is it necessary/worth doing?

thanks for your time again
jag

 

Yes it is worth doing...

For the SPI if your hardware firewall has that do it on that instead of Look 'n' Stop.

The Hardware firewall works well against attacks that sometimes might kick a software firewall off and render it useless. The software firewall works well for applications that you want to accept or deny but also consider this.

Look 'n' Stop prob. has more power over settting up specific rules than any hardware firewall I have seen yet.

 

Thanks MK

I'm running LnS as suggested with my router and the LnS log has gone so quiet, that it's almost eerie, compared with the usual activity. From the router syslog, seems like it's doing the job

Now that the external threats are being dealt with, after reading the excellent firewalltester.com, is there more I could do about potential internal threats with respect to configuring the router?
The application filtering on LnS is running as it should be, but I'm uncertain how to go about configuring the router. The smc router has some predefined ports you can allow/block which is straightforward, and the more complicated choices about tcp/udp port config. Is this individual port config worth doing via the router aswell, in addition to LnS application filtering? And if so, any good resources to read up on for configuring h/w firewalls/routers for this

From my limited knowledge, the router strengths are from defending against external threats, but limited in comparison to defending against internal threats, when compared to s/w f/w like LnS?

Sorry for the continuous questions...on a steep learning curve

regards
jag

 

Hi,

yes your router does protect against most of the external attacks, but will unconditionally accept any internal outbound requests (e.g HTTP, SMTP, DNS, etc...).

A personal firewall on your computer is a great addition to control outbound attempts.

If you are looking at how to secure you more, you can read this :
http://www.firewallleaktester.com/advices.htm
http://www.firewallleaktester.com/software.htm
http://www.firewallleaktester.com/documents.htm

Regards,

gkweb.