mike wrote:
> Thanks to those wha answered Steve Wilsons question
>
> (Incidentally. can anyone tell me why so many names in this ng appear as a
> jumble of symbols, although my tooltip sorts them into English?)
>
> The real question is - I've got 3 firewalls, one in an ADSL router, the
> Windows Firewall, and I'm using Comodo.
>
> The reason I like Comodo is it tells me if any prog is phoning home, and
> requires a permission.
>
> Can I turn off both the other two, or is another one preferable, or do I
> need more than one?
>
> I'd prefer to have just one running, as I used to before routers and
> Windows Firewalls, I never had a sniff of trouble with one of the several
> excellent freeware jobs.
>
> So can I use just one? If so. which?
>
> TIA
>
> mike
You do need to have a firewall running, but there's no point in
running more than one. My position is that running two or more software
firewalls simultaneously is generally unnecessary and can _sometimes_
cause conflicts, potentially negating the protection of both. Even ig
there is no conflict, having two firewalls running simultaneously is
most certainly an unnecessary drain on system resources, without
providing any additional benefit.
As Comodo is the superior product, by far, I'd recommend that you
disable the Windows firewall.
If you use a router with NAT, it's still a very good idea to use a
3rd party software firewall. Like WinXP's built-in firewall,
NAT-capable routers do nothing to protect the user from him/herself (or
any "curious," over-confident teenagers in the home). Again -- and I
cannot emphasize this enough -- almost all spyware and many Trojans and
worms are downloaded and installed deliberately (albeit unknowingly) by
the user. So a software firewall, such as Comodo, Sygate or ZoneAlarm,
that can detect and warn the user of unauthorized out-going traffic is
an important element of protecting one's privacy and security, alerting
you to an unwanted malware application's activity. (Remember: Most
antivirus applications do not even scan for or protect you from
adware/spyware, because, after all, you've installed them yourself, so
you must want them there, right?)
I use both a router with NAT and Sygate Personal Firewall, even
though I generally know better than to install scumware. When it
comes to computer security and protecting my privacy, I prefer the old
"belt and suspenders" approach. In the professional IT community,
this is also known as a "layered defense." Basically, it comes down
to never, ever "putting all of your eggs in one basket."
--
Bruce Chambers
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