Re: Consumer Grade - IPV6 Enabled Router Firewalls.

[Steven Bellovin <smb () cs columbia edu>]

On Dec 14, 2009, at 11:47 PM, Joel Jaeggli wrote:

> Owen DeLong wrote:
> > > > UPnP is a bad idea that (fortunately) doesn't apply to IPv6 anyway.
> > > >
> > > > You don't need UPnP if you'r not doing NAT.
> > >
> > > wishful thinking.
> > >
> > > you're likely to still have a staeful firewall and in the consumer space
> > > someone is likely to want to punch holes in it.
> >
> > Yes, SI will still be needed.  However, UPnP is, at it's heart a way to
> > allow
> > arbitrary unauthenticated applications the power to amend your security
> > policy to their will.  Can you possibly explain any way in which such a
> > thing is at all superior to no firewall at all?
>
> I'm a consumer, I want to buy something, take it home, turn it on and
> have it work. I don't have an IT department. How the manufacturers solve
> that is their problem.
>
> As a consumer my preferences for a security posture to the extent that I
> have one are:
>
> don't hose me
>
> don't make my life any more complicated than necessary
>
> > I would argue that a firewall that can be reconfigured by any applet a user
> > clicks on (whether they know it or not) is actually less useful than no
> > firewall because it creates the illusion in the users mind that there is a
> > firewall protecting them.
>
> Stable outgoing connections for p2p apps, messaging, gaming platforms
> and foo website with java script based rpc mechanisms have similar
> properties. I don't sleep soundly at night becasuse the $49 buffalo
> router I bought off an endcap at frys uses iptables, I sleep soundly
> because I don't care.
Precisely.  And if you want to get picky, remember that "availability" is part
of the standard definition of security.  A firewall that doesn't let me play
Chocolate-Sucking Zombie Monsters is an attack on the availability of that
gmae, albeit from the purest of motives.

No, I'm not saying that this is good.  I am saying that in the real world, it
*will* happen.


                --Steve Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb