Windows firewall or 3rd party firewall?
August 8th, 2016
what are you using? The windows firewall or 3rd party firewall? What are the reasons why you`re using one of each?
Kind regards
Unless your router is ancient, it should have an inbuilt firewall.. Happy to stick with that and have a static IP so changes each day or two when the net fs out…
I’m using Kaspersky which has it’s own firewall so I kept it like that and never had no problems. I don’t even know what is windows firewall.
For a client pc you would want more than just a firewall you would wan endpoint security with HIPS, HTTP/Https inspection etc
For more than just a firewall which isn’t much use these days.
Means?
he meant , you need an advanced security suite with additional features where firewall alone wouldnt be sufficient to protect system but i guess you only wonder firewall part of it protection.
before mentioning about protection part , there is a great advantage of third party firewalls with the option of “block internet access” of a specific file or folder cuz it is pain in windows to create rules for it , i dunno about win 10 maybe it is changed with it. most common example would be this since you deal with games and repacks , you sometimes need to block the internet or network access of executable of game for cracking reasons with windows you can only easily block inbound ones where inbound is connections which are made to your pc. internet on the other hand uses outbound connection to connect places so you need to create specific rule for a file where outbound connection is also blocked. it can take just a few clicks with 3rd party firewalls if they have this feature.
not every third party firewall is user friendly and some are very obtrusive which swarms you with pop-ups. the best 2 paid firewalls for a home user would be kaspersky’s and norton’s but you cant have them alone you need their av suite. their features and protection capability is far beyond windows’ firewall. it is even beyond comparison. they both good for being unobtrusive and dealing with any kind malicious case which a home user can face. for free standalone 3rd party firewalls , zonealarm and comodo firewalls were always popular and still is. although i didnt use any of it , zonealarm seemed better when i made a quick review.
and lastly protection difference between windows and 3rd party firewalls. for a standard home user ; windows firewall would be sufficient for network protection. it is not a bad firewall so dont think it is inbuilt and bad but since you deal with deeply which makes you a non-standard home user. i suggest you to use a third party firewall and i strongly suggest kaspersky internet security as a choice cuz of its wise engine with the least false positives which is also supported by cloud database when it comes to crack files.
router firewall wouldnt protect you cuz you wouldnt be under attack by ddos or anything like it. most probable scenario for you lets say, when you are doing a game repack , you download a malicious executable which enables inbound connections to your pc to for malicious purposes. at this point a router does not block that connection cuz it wouldnt know if you really requested that connection or if it is really malicious. even if there is a router which can do that , you pay fortune for it. on the other hand a firewall inside the windows can prevent such thing. windows’ own firewall can block those types of connections depending on the engineering level of the malware and kaspersky will block certainly regardless of the its threat level cuz it will detect the file which tries that connection will block it immediately by behavioral engine even not it will check cloud for it and will block it eventually.
if you ask what will happen if it cant check cloud or if i dont have internet connection at that moment ? then it will be automatically blocked regardless if it is malicious or not. by default kaspersky’s firewall blocks all inbound connections except known digitally signed files which are stored in the local cache such as windows’ system files. so it is pretty good and very hard to breach by normal means where a file is acting as an intermediary.
The problem is many vpn managers like perfect privacy are based on windows firewall. They won`t work with 3rd party firewalls, because there is a DNS leak protection, if the vpn tunnel will get lost, there are no other connections possible. But, as normal user, i won`t use a vpn connection. The problem is that if you will install a good 3rd party firewall, you can`t choose to use it only on windows user. So what do now?
i know about vpns and how they work technically but i cant give you feedback like an actual user who tried combinations.
vpns also add some additional security features which can boost protection when combined with windows firewall. if you are using a legit version of a popular vpn service not a cracked one with modified executables , a good firewall should recognize it ; most possibly through a digital signature on the file and let it to re-route the traffic. if this does not happening then that firewall is not good enough. i mean vpns has became the reality of the world not only related to but also fight against censorship. so lets say kaspersky’s or norton’s firewall automatically blocks all legit vpns automatically then they lose a major amount customers which is really illogical. if the problem is related to vpn client where it cant work with any other firewall than windows one then there is nothing can be done but i believe there should be ones which can integrate with other firewalls. again you need direct feedback from people who tried many different combinations. considerable amount of people here are using vpn services so wait for their feedback to see if they work with a 3rd party firewall. saying again , any modified .exe file tries routing network traffic will be automatically blocked by any firewall and it should be. so you must use legit popular vpns.
your second question , i dont know any kind of real time monitoring security software which works user based if thats what you meant. those things integrates at system level which contains all users cuz protecting a single user wouldnt make any difference when system gets infected through another user.
i didnt understand the real problem , you have doubts about efficiency of windows firewall and wanna create 2 user accounts where you are doing important things on one and hobby things on another , also you want different level of protection for each account ? if thats what you are after , it is really tricky and problematic thing to do which can end with failure even if you do everything right. virtual machine may be solution for it but i dont have enough knowledge to talk about it