Windows Firewall

Firewall is a first line of defense which protect your internet and external threats including unauthorized access to your system, identity theft, eavesdropping, privacy loss and hackers’ attacks.  It provides a protective barrier between your computer and the online threats. There are two types of the firewall software and hardware.  By default, Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 2003 Serve provide the built-in stateful firewall and you can configure it according to your security requirements. It has been designed for the home and business users.  You can define rules, configure policies and block ports. It can work with every type of network connections like wired, wireless or VPN.

Common Features

• Outbound packet filtering.
• Integrated IPsec.
• IPV6 connection filtering.
• Blocks incoming network connections.
• Allow/Deny network services to the network users.
• Security logging.
• Ports scanning/blocking.

How To Enable/Disable Firewall in Windows XP

You can enable and disable the firewall in Windows XP Home/Professional edition by the following method.

• Click Start > Control panel and double click network connection.
• In the network connection, right click the local area connection and click properties.
• In the properties click Advance and in the Windows firewall click settings.
• In the Windows Firewall Window select “On Recommended to turn on the firewall and select “Off” to turn off the firewall.
• Alternatively, click start > run and type firewall.cpl and press enter. You will find the same firewall window and here you can perform the same action.
• In the Firewall Window, click the Advance tab, select your internet connection and click setting. Here you can allow or deny the internet services like HTTP, FTP, SMTP, POP3 and Remote desktop to your network users.
• In the ICMP, you can allow or block the PING requests to your computer from the other computers in your network.
• In the Firewall Windows > Exceptions, you can block the potentially dangerous programs, .exe files and the ports.