Simple Outbound blocker with xp sp3 firewall?

Hi, a friend of mine is using XP PRO SP3 with the inbuilt firewall on, and also has a hardware router.
This is enough, and all is working fine, hasn't really had any problems so far, also has avast installed.
What is needed though is a very simple light outbound firewall to go with the XP one. Mainly it is to manually choose programs to block from accessing the net, but if there is a light, fast program that might also do automatic outbound, then that would be ok, but not too much pop-ups.

Is there anything that would do this nicely?


Thanks!

 

tell to have the shieldsup test "all ports"...
also in hardware-firewall there should be some settings...
mine for example has it for inbound and outbound rules.

 

Try Ghostwall, just 800Kb and no bundled junk. Plus its free for personal and corporate use.

Else try SoftPerfect Personal Firewall. Another simplistic free firewall without any HIPS, with high levels of control.

 

Sounds like the same need that I had. The best choices would be LookNStop if you want a paid program. The interface to manage the applications that you have blocked/allowed is really top notch. Also is one of the least RAM hungry- it will take up ~6000K.

If you want a free program (and there are many), Online Armor Free would be my suggestion. Not as light as LNS, but still will be under 20,000K for all 4 of its modules. Remeber that OA has HIPS (not very chatty, thank God).

ps- Ghostwall is only inbound.

 

Thanks for the replies.

Bookmarked the Ghostsecurity site, their software is so small. But I find it strange that ghostwall is inbound only, why make it so similar to ms firewall?

Anyway, I'm only after free, and main purpose really is to be able to manually add certain programs to block, other features included is a bonus, if the footprint remains small, and fast.


The free ones I've seen so far are Ghostwall(inbound only, what about Appdefend?), Online armor, Outpost free, sunbelt free, comodo.

I have comodo on my pc, I think its too much for this purpose though.


So would OA be the pick out of those, even though I wasn't intending on replacing the MS firewall altogether?




Thanks again!

 

Hello,

If original idea was to have a guard watching any outbound connections, as to then create a 'block rule' in Win 7 firewall; you could use Threatfire with the custom rule 'warn on apps requesting connections' ticked.

brgds
mack

 

I believe OA with hips disabled is what you want.

 

Allthough fine firewalls, they both have no outbound application control, which I understood the OP asked for

Simple free firewalls with outbound control, have a look at kerio 2.15 or Ashampoo

 

The OP said "xp sp3 firewall", no?

Regards,
François

 

I have yet to find what you are seeking. You are looking for something like LittleSnitch, which is for a Mac. But I have not seen the equivilent for XP at all.

Your options are limited. Application aware firewalls abound, as a few have been mentioned here. You might as well forget using XP Firewall though it you go with a different one.

You might look at DSA (dnymaic security agent), as it 'sort of' has this capability. It does have a rude firewall, but no real interface to it. Its downfall is that it restricts ping outside the local subnet, which for some may not be an issue but it is for me.

As mentioned, ThreatFire might work. I gave up on that program though. SoftPerfect is not application aware, but is a good little firewall if you know what ports you want to block. Not much reason to use it though in your case.

Outpost used to be the firewall I used a lot. I stopped using it after version 4 though. I stopped using most of them after they 'matured' into security suites, but that is just me.

I heard SSM had some components in it like you speak of, but not worth the trouble for me. Geswall might as well. I think DefenseWall might also. These of course are more HIPS/IDS type applications, but this way you can still use XP Firewall.

Personally I think you need to make a choise. If you REALLY REALLY need to block outbound applications, you should probably just dump xp firewall and move into a 3rd party firewall to fulfill all your needs. There are many to choose from, likely though you will pick the one that you can understand/navigate the easiest. That is what I strive for. I don't need fort knox, I just need to be able to manipulate the locks on my connection easily.

Sul.

 

DSA has been discontinued.
It has been replaced by Privatefirewall, whch is now free:
http://www.privacyware.com/personal_firewall.html
PF's Version history:
http://www.privacyware.com/PF_support.html

 

i believe someone hit it on the head when they recommended OA. with OA free and Program Guard disabled, you have a simple to use very effective application level, outbound controlling firewall

Mike

 

DSA runs on the same firewall engine as PrivateFirewall and can be configured with the PrivateFirewall interface if you save the files from a previous installation. I would use it to fine tune the firewall features such as lifting the ping restrictions you noted.

It's a shame they had to get rid of DSA. The last version they released had fewer popups but performed worse on HIPS tests like Comodo leak test.

 

Thanks, ok, I think I'm just going to try out all the free ones mentioned here (positively), when I have enough time, just have a few other things to install

Thanks again

 

I agree, I'm using this right now and it works really well.