Kerio personal firewall

[Tom]

Can anybody tell me anything about setting this up? I used zonealarm before, which was perfectly ok, but I was told that Kerio is better, as it is less popular, and therefore less of a target. It is a bit less user friendly then ZA, so any tips?

 

[Tom]

I uninstalled it, mainly because I didn't have the slightest idea what it was going on about.

 

[Jonty]

lol ZoneAlarm should be more than adequate for most people's needs, otherwise there are always programs like Outpost (Drivers and Utilities) which offer a bit more sophistication.

Kind Regards

 

[Chameleon]

Kerio is highly recommended from me.
It's fairly simple to setup. I found the best method was to delete all rules and then add one in which basically said "STOP EVERYTHING!!!!" then call up the firewall log file and take a look at what is being blocked. It will tell you exactly what is trying to get access, what protocol and local port it is trying to use and what remote ip and port is trying to establish a connection with. Then, for those you wish to allow access, based upon this information, you build a rule with these details in it, just above the "STOP EVERYTHING!!!!" rule, saying "allow this". Then set the firewall to deny everything unless it has a rule. Bingo!
You sometimes find certain things are a pain to setup a rule for, cos they use so many ports or the remote ip/port can vary often. For these, you can setup a less specific rule, e.g. allow outgoing from this programme to any ip/port, but have it listed under the "STOP EVERYTHING!!!!" rule, which you can promote upwards only when you need to use this program, then move it back afterwards.
There is a guide to setting it up somewhere. Try doing a Kerio Personal Firewall search on google, if you decide to give it another go.

This is of course the "they are watching me ........ they are watching us all ........ trust nobody ......... wibble wibble black black black black black black ......." school of security thought though ...... if you know what i mean heheh

You aint seen me roight