 | By Mark Joseph Edwards If you chose the firewall on your PC based on reputation, you may be in for an unpleasant surprise. The Matousec Firewall Challenge answers the million-dollar question: “Is my firewall really protecting me?” |
Firewalls that pass the leak test
Defending against data leaks is an important aspect of any firewall. Leak-testing sites such as the popular PC Flank help you determine whether a given firewall can stand up to the various tricks that the bad guys pull in their efforts to steal your data.
I recently came across a leak-testing project that I consider to be above and beyond the others: the Firewall Challenge is run by Matousec, a security consulting and research group named after its founder, David Matousek. The security researchers and consultants of Matousec bring far more knowledge to firewall leak testing than most competing sites, which gives me more confidence in their results.
Over the past several weeks, the Matousec team has been putting personal firewalls through the wringer. Their tests are based on four categories: data leaks; terminations; bypasses; and stability, reliability, and other factors. Matousec tests using Windows XP with SP2 and Internet Explorer 6.
So far, the results are staggering: of the 19 firewalls tested, 10 failed miserably (including Windows Live OneCare) and as such should not be relied upon to protect your system. Only five of the firewalls tested received a rating of “excellent” or “very good.” Three others were rated “good,” and one was rated “poor.”
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