The digital era of today is largely dependent on the internet and the big brands have successfully running websites that are also operating as their outlets as people of today like to do online shopping. The facility of online stores and the use of plastic money, all are not as simple as they might seem to be to a common man.in fact, the trend of hacking computer systems and ATM cards is increasing at an alarming rate. In such circumstances, some measures have to be taken in order to protect your computers from an attack of hackers and viruses.
What is a Firewall?
A firewall is a product that is specially designed for permission and denial of transmission or networks that are based upon certain rules. The big companies and organizations use the WAF to protect their computer systems against illegal access. It has become a common practice in the third world countries that people hack the bank accounts of others and withdraw money from their Atm cards. A web application Firewall is a security system that stops illegal attempts to access the website while letting the normal legal sources of communication work perfectly. It is just because of an effective firewall that your computer system works properly without any threat of being hacked. The basic function of a firewall is to work as a repellent for bad people who are involved in illegal practices and letting the online traffic function smoothly.
Different types of Firewall
There are two major types of firewalls, one is a software-based firewall and the other is hardware based firewall.
Software-based Firewalls
Software-based firewalls are the ones that are installed on a computer using the software. It is done very conveniently and in time efficient manner and does not require any more hardware. Like all other computer products Software-based firewall also has some pros and cons of its own.
Pros of Software-based Firewall
- It is easy to set up
- Does not require much time for installation
- Does not need any new hardware
Cons of Software-based Firewall
- It is effective only for the computer it is installed in, it means that if two or more computers are working on a single network the software firewall will not prove effective for all, but only for one.
- One more con of this type of firewall is that it uses a lot of system resources.
All latest computers come with pre-installed software-based firewalls. But if you really need to try a firewall of your own choice then you can try the one called ZoneAlarm. According to experts, it is a good quality software based web application firewall.
Hardware-based firewall
If you run an organization that has a network of its own then the software-based firewall won’t do any good to you. This is the time when you need a dedicated computer where you install the hardware-based firewall and then configure it to act as a doorway to your company network. For this configuration to work properly the computer with firewall should be positioned between the network and the internet and two network cards should be used to fit it in place. The biggest advantage of this type of firewall is that an attacker who tries to hack the system will be forced to compromise the firewall system before accessing any other resource. This type of firewall protects the whole network and not only the system on which the firewall is installed. The biggest disadvantage of this type of firewall is the need for more hardware.
