Firewall Wizards mailing list archives
Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres
From: "Paul D. Robertson" <paul () compuwar net>
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2005 16:04:28 -0500 (EST)
On Wed, 26 Jan 2005, Shimon Silberschlag wrote:
Hello Group, In the past, I used to hear the recommendation that an internet facing firewall setup should include at least 2 firewalls from different manufacturers. The reasoning behind it was that if you had a fatal vulnerability in one of them, one that could enable an attacker to "own" the first, the second one will resist a similar attack.
That wasn't the only rationale for not having a single layer of failure...
Today, when attacks are shifting towards using the already open ports on the firewall, at the application level, do you think that such a setup is still mandatory and/or recommended? Do you see such setups implemented? Or does most setups include a single FW with multiple DMZs, connected directly to the internal network? Perhaps the screened subnet variety with 2 FW, but the same brand, is the most popular?
I still try to at least get a screening router up front that does have a different packet filtering implementation (so I don't generally use green firewalls.) To me, it's a matter of not designing easy to fail infrastructure. With two devices, you have the chance to catch configuration failures, not just implementation failures. If possible, it's nice to have two different groups handling each piece in coordination, so that you have to have two people co-opted to start punching holes, especially admin-installed backdoors. With commodity pricing on firewalls, it's really a question of "what do you have to lose?" Paul ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Paul D. Robertson "My statements in this message are personal opinions paul () compuwar net which may have no basis whatsoever in fact." _______________________________________________ firewall-wizards mailing list firewall-wizards () honor icsalabs com http://honor.icsalabs.com/mailman/listinfo/firewall-wizards
Current thread:
- Exchange 2003 OWA security questions MHawkins (Jan 19)
- Re: Exchange 2003 OWA security questions Paul D. Robertson (Jan 19)
- Re: Exchange 2003 OWA security questions Darryl Luff (Jan 21)
- Re: Exchange 2003 OWA security questions Paul D. Robertson (Jan 21)
- Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Shimon Silberschlag (Jan 26)
- Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Paul D. Robertson (Jan 26)
- Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Kevin (Jan 27)
- Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Shimon Silberschlag (Jan 27)
- Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Paul D. Robertson (Jan 28)
- Re: Exchange 2003 OWA security questions Paul D. Robertson (Jan 21)
- Re: Multiple firewalls from different manufactureres Devdas Bhagat (Jan 27)
- Application-level Attacks Crispin Cowan (Jan 28)
- Re: Application-level Attacks Adam Shostack (Jan 28)
- Re: Application-level Attacks Devdas Bhagat (Jan 28)
- Re: Application-level Attacks Adam Shostack (Jan 28)
- Re: Application-level Attacks Devdas Bhagat (Jan 28)
- Re: Application-level Attacks Adam Shostack (Jan 28)