Personal firewall

A personal firewall is an application which controls network traffic to and from a computer, permitting or denying communications based on a security policy.

For example, a laptop computer may be used on a trusted intranet at a workplace where minimal protection is needed as a conventional firewall is already in place, and services that require open ports such as file and printer sharing are useful.

The same laptop could be used at public Wi-Fi hotspots, where it may be necessary to decide the level of trust and reconfigure firewall settings to limit traffic to and from the computer.

Woeltje brought in all the leading firewall vendors for meetings concerning the products being considered for use for the perimeter security of the BudNET network, SSgt.

With the exception of the representatives from the Cyberguard Corporation, every vendor said that not only did that not have any firewall software that could be used in this way but they also said that the idea was crazy and unworkable.

But, today we know they were wrong because the use of personal firewall software has become a de facto computer security standard.