RE: PC Firewall Choices

["Greg" <full-disclosure2 () pchandyman com au>]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Nic Werner [mailto:nicwerner () gmail com] 
> Sent: Wednesday, 18 January 2006 10:42 AM
> To: Greg
> Cc: full-disclosure () lists grok org uk
> Subject: Re: [Full-disclosure] PC Firewall Choices
>
>
> On 1/17/06, Greg <full-disclosure2 () pchandyman com au> wrote:
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: full-disclosure-bounces () lists grok org uk
> > > [mailto:full-disclosure-bounces () lists grok org uk] On 
> Behalf Of Nic 
> > > Werner
> > > Sent: Wednesday, 18 January 2006 10:05 AM
> > > To: Steven
> > > Cc: full-disclosure () lists grok org uk
> > > Subject: Re: [Full-disclosure] PC Firewall Choices
> > > Importance: High
> > >
> > >
> > > ZoneAlarm - gets in the way, and hard to diagnose 
> problems. You end 
> > > up turning it off because it never remembers your 
> settings and you 
> > > can't trust it.
> >
> > Rubbish. Sure it gets in the way. It is MEANT to get in the way. If 
> > you close it down, it is likely because you don't know how to drive 
> > it. The prog CAN be a little hard to newbies to understand 
> if you want 
> > to go internet banking etc but people on this list ought to 
> know how 
> > to handle it.
>
> Getting in your way as opposed to letting you get work done 
> are two different things. Kerio does a great job of popping 
> up and explaining what is happening while I've seen more 
> people confused by ZA and its dialogs
>
> No, we've turned ZA off as web sites or programs won't load 
> (Ciscoworks, nGenius, etc) and even though we've checked the 
> logs of ZA, nothing shows as being blocked. Turn it off and 
> everything magically works. I will never run the bloat that is ZA.

As I said - if you don't know how to drive it, that will happen. It is
variable enough, if you want to use it that is, to allow you to work at any
web site the way you want.....either Pro or Free versions, BTW.

> Talk about trust, I don't trust the logging capability of ZA 
> at all due to examples like the above. While I enjoy your 
> rant to the choir about not trusting programs, my point is 
> that ZA doesn't show everything while it is actively blocking 
> something.

Did I say I trusted it? I said I loved it as it does a good job of that at
least. It also shows so-called security professionals at installations that
their belief in harware based protection is just ridiculous.

There was no rant from me no preaching to the choir. I guess maybe I stated
the bleedingly obvious but then it isnt so obvious to everyone no doubt.

> To each their own! As you can see Steven, you should just 
> download each one and spend about a week fussing around.
>
> - Nic.

I agree with that but I would also like to point out that whatever you
choose, if you don't feel your knowledge is up to it, then you need to read,
read and read some more all over the place. Find out every little droplet of
info you can about what people have done, found etc with the program of your
choice. You may find the program you like because it is so user friendly is
not up to scratch while the one that "gets in the way" may suit you better
depending on what you want it for once you learn how to drive the damned
thing.


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