Forums
New posts
Articles
Product Reviews
Policies
FAQ
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
New posts
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Forums
Apple Computing Products:
macOS - Operating System
Question about firewall
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="cwa107" data-source="post: 942417" data-attributes="member: 24098"><p>With all due respect to DarkestRitual, with the complexity of modern operating systems, and based on the fact that the Darwin kernel is open-source, and compounded by the fact that over the years many different vulnerabilities have been found in OS X (granted, they have been subsequently patched), I would definitely recommend turning the firewall on - and using it in stealth mode (which basically makes your machine ignore ICMP echo requests).</p><p></p><p>If you're sitting behind a router (and almost all modern modems have their own NAT-based firewall), you likely won't need it. But in the odd event that someone is able to sneak into your local network and is aware of an undocumented vulnerability, it's better to be safe than sorry, in my opinion. Firewalls that block outgoing traffic can be troublesome if they're not well-maintained, but incoming firewalls, are pretty unobtrusive. I've been running the OS X firewall since 10.4 and have never encountered a firewall problem. Even if you decide to do file/printer sharing or setup a server of some sort, the firewall is opened up to allow that type of traffic, so you should be fine to leave it on all the time.</p><p></p><p>So, to answer your question directly - yes, I would enable the firewall. And no, I don't think you'll have any problem having left it open for a few hours. In the unlikely event that there was someone knocking at the door, turning the firewall on would have shut that attack down very quickly.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="cwa107, post: 942417, member: 24098"] With all due respect to DarkestRitual, with the complexity of modern operating systems, and based on the fact that the Darwin kernel is open-source, and compounded by the fact that over the years many different vulnerabilities have been found in OS X (granted, they have been subsequently patched), I would definitely recommend turning the firewall on - and using it in stealth mode (which basically makes your machine ignore ICMP echo requests). If you're sitting behind a router (and almost all modern modems have their own NAT-based firewall), you likely won't need it. But in the odd event that someone is able to sneak into your local network and is aware of an undocumented vulnerability, it's better to be safe than sorry, in my opinion. Firewalls that block outgoing traffic can be troublesome if they're not well-maintained, but incoming firewalls, are pretty unobtrusive. I've been running the OS X firewall since 10.4 and have never encountered a firewall problem. Even if you decide to do file/printer sharing or setup a server of some sort, the firewall is opened up to allow that type of traffic, so you should be fine to leave it on all the time. So, to answer your question directly - yes, I would enable the firewall. And no, I don't think you'll have any problem having left it open for a few hours. In the unlikely event that there was someone knocking at the door, turning the firewall on would have shut that attack down very quickly. [/QUOTE]
Verification
Post reply
Forums
Apple Computing Products:
macOS - Operating System
Question about firewall
Top