Firewall for Notebooks

Actually, KPF is a decent firewall but it has no concept of zones per SSID.

It is also in the moderate overhead (10-20MB RAM) range.

It has the additional restriction that the free version will disable all networking functions after 30 days.

 

Actually, what you really want to check are page faults and memory faults. OS Swapouts of memory for obscenely hungry applications don'r show as CPU usage. Turn on PFs on task manager to get the real picture.

Which is why I suggested that BSSID is better. SSID is more useful than IP address, but many firewalls filter on IP.

The firewall should clamp down any time it sees an SSID of lynksys, default, wlan, etc. and only allow particular, specified ssids to be trusted, and only if protected by WAP/WEP. It should also use the BSSID to prevent spoofing.

 

since we're talking about a firewall for laptops, has anyone used zonealarm wireless security? any opinions?

 

I didn't try it, but doesn't ZoneAlarm Pro (the regular) has options for wireless security too? Or am I wrong (never used wireless networks...)

 

These settings have nothing to do with wireless networks.

Zone Alarm is not a good choice for a notebook because it differentiates trusted zone by IP address. This is somewhat usefully if you set YOUR network to 192.168.75.1 for example, since most routers are 192.168.0-3.1, but you really want to have your settings such that a particular SSID-BSSID is required.

It's amazing that I have yet to find any such utility that I can recommend to my clients!

 

Do you need a firewall for more than one laptop?

If so, consider a central managed system, with decent password protection. Checkpoint (ZoneAlarm), Sygate, Outpost Office, Netop. It has to be possible to have it use different policies for the LAN, internet, Wifi settings.

 

Remember that one requirement of a firewall is low resources.
My experience with zone alarm is that the system drain is worse than half of the threats out there.

 

I am looking for a firewall to recommend or sell for computers I service. The other problem is that most firewalls prompt users for every little change... sounds like a good idea but most users answer one wrong... I just got back from a service call this afternoon where the client killed her computer because after a windows update the firewall prompted her and she answered wrong.

 

Black Ice is a popular choice in the corporate environment as after it has done it's initial baseline it only alerts for intrusions or if you install a new app. In the corporate environment PCs / laptops are often tightly locked down so the end user can't add new programs - hence there are very few application alerts.