Re: Proxies, opensource and the general market: what's wrong with us?

[Magosányi Árpád <mag () magwas rulez org>]

On 2011-04-26 09:25, Tracy Reed wrote:
> Yes. Here we have a problem somewhat like the classical meaning of 
> "hacker" vs
> the common meaning of "hacker". And this firewall vs packet filter debate may
> not even have that much legitimacy. I can find a number of people who still
> subscribe to the classical idea of a hacker but a few of the denizens of this
> mailing list are the only ones I know of who insist on issuing a correction
> when someone calls a packet filter a firewall. It just seems like pointless
> snobbery.
But it is not. Network perimeter defence is an industry seriously hit by 
marketing bullshit from some vendors, who could not come out with a 
decent firewall, so redefined the term to be applicable to their products.
Doing this they came out with a definition which goes against basic 
security principles and empties the meaning of the word to the extent 
which makes nearly pointless to have "firewalls".
This led to a state of affairs where there is practically no discussion 
about a lot of important questions of network perimeter defense, because 
the majority of the "firewall" people are kept in a darkness about the 
issue to the extent that they do not have the background even to ask the 
right questions.
This means that even though those same vendors now would be in the 
position to implement actually meaningful features, they do not do it 
because they have conditioned their consumers to not think about such 
things.

When you see someone trying to correct this "firewall = packet filter" 
nonsense, you actually see a vain attempt to correct these mistakes. 
Because the first step is to meaningfully discuss something is to have 
meaningful definitions.

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