Firewall Protection
126
NETGEAR ProSAFE VPN Firewall FVS318G v2
About Firewall Protection
A firewall protects one network (the trusted network, such as your LAN) from another (the
untrusted network, such as the Internet), while allowing communication between the two. You
can further segment keyword blocking to certain known groups. For information about how to
set up LAN groups, see
Manage IPv4 Groups and Hosts (IPv4 LAN Groups)
on page 71.
For IPv4, a firewall incorporates the functions of a Network Address Translation (NAT) router,
protects the trusted network from hacker intrusions or attacks, and controls the types of traffic
that can flow between the Internet, DMZ, and LAN. Unlike simple NAT routers, a firewall uses
a process called stateful packet inspection to protect your network from attacks and
intrusions. NAT performs a limited stateful inspection in that it considers whether the
incoming packet is in response to an outgoing request, but true stateful packet inspection
goes far beyond NAT.
For IPv6, which in itself provides stronger security than IPv4, a firewall in particular controls
the exchange of traffic between the Internet, DMZ, and LAN.
Administrator Tips
Consider the following operational items:
1.
As an option, you can enable remote management if you must manage distant sites
from a central location.
For more information, see
Configure Authentication Domains, Groups, and Users
on
page 287 and
Configure Remote Management Access
on page 328.
2.
Although rules are the basic way of managing the traffic through your system (see
Overview
of Rules to Block or Allow Specific Kinds of Traffic
on page 127), you can further refine your
control using the following features and capabilities of the VPN firewall:
•
Groups and hosts
. See
Manage IPv4 Groups and Hosts (IPv4 LAN Groups)
on
page 71.
•
Services
. See
Outbound Rules
on page 128 and
Inbound Rules
on page 130.
•
Schedules
. See
Set a Schedule to Block or Allow Specific Traffic
on page 195.
•
Allowing or blocking sites
. See
Configure Content Filtering
on page 189.
•
Source MAC filtering
. See
Enable Source MAC Filtering
on page 196.
•
Port triggering
. See
Configure Port Triggering
on page 206.
3.
Some firewall settings might affect the performance of the VPN firewall.
For more information, see
Performance Management
on page 320.
4.
The firewall logs can be configured to log and then email denial of access, general attack,
and other information to a specified email address.
For information about how to configure logging and notifications, see
Configure Logging,
Alerts, and Event Notifications
on page 353.
