I have been using Avast premier for 2 years without issue, a few months ago i installed a Alexa skill for my Echo which connects to my PC to stream music, it required manually opening a port, which whilst i have moderate computer knowledge, this didn’t extend to firewalls and networking, so it was a bit of a job and a half to setup (especially as it wasn’t easy to find how to manually tell avast to open said port), but with some time and patience i got the thing up and running. Good
Yesterday however, after asking my echo device to play the music, nothing happened, i checked my on-screen (PC) user interface to see it was telling me the port was blocked, so after checking avast, sure enough, the firewall logs was blocking said port.
Well it wasn’t easy to set up in the first place but i spent 2 hours trying to get this to work, again i have little to no knowledge in this area, the guide for setup wasn’t the best as it just stated in needs a incoming connection to port 52050 via a TCP connection, no idea what this meant, i tried everything avast had to offer to no avail, i grew tired and disabled avast firewall and not had any issues since (the “skill” is built to auto add exceptions to windows defender).
So what i was wondering, whilst i am still using my avast premier for anti-virus and the rest of its features, will i really need/miss windows defender? Generally i have made it a rule of thumb to not trust built in windows devices as they usually are mediocre at the best of times, when windows 10 was released there was talk that defender was now a capable anti-virus/firewall, so i have had little choice to fall back to it as a firewall due to avast not playing ball, is it good enough to rely on this or is avast a more reliable firewall? (i rather hope it isn’t considering it clearly doesn’t want said device to operate through it).
NOTE:The Network profiles control the settings which determine how strictly Firewall protects your PC.
Private: a lower level of security suitable for when your PC is connected to a trusted network such as your home or work network. This profile enables better connectivity, and permits all communication within the network.
Public: a higher level of security suitable for when your PC is connected to a public network such as in a cafe or airport. Because public networks present greater security risks, no incoming communication is permitted when this profile is set.
-the firewall is only for inbound , not outbound and doesn’t alert you, so is similar to your router
-you cannot create a rule based on FQDN , only on IP
-can be easily bypassed by a parent application launching a child application
For a “connoisseur” Windows firewall is equal to ZERO
-the firewall is only for inbound , not outbound and doesn't alert you, so is similar to your router
-you cannot create a rule based on FQDN , only on IP
-can be easily bypassed by a parent application launching a child application
For a “connoisseur” Windows firewall is equal to ZERO
TinyWall is a free software to harden and control the advanced firewall built into modern Windows systems. >> https://tinywall.pados.hu
We are not talking about “Windows Firewall” anymore this is “Windows Firewall+ something”
If an application , let’s say Iexplore.exe is allowed TCP 80 and 443 and another one , let’s say virus.exe is using Iexplore.exe to connect to the internet, you will never get a notification or block from any “Windows Firewall” combination regarding virus.exe, which will connect to the internet behind your firewall.
This way of accessing the internet is used by A LOT of applications (Adobe, Malwarebytes, Revo uninstaller etc)
Using Windows Firewall in any combination ( Windows Firewall Controll by Binisoft, Tiny Wall, etc) just creates an illusion of protection;you will see here and there several pop-ups and assume “is working”
We are not talking about "Windows Firewall" anymore this is "Windows Firewall+ something"
you said winfirewall does not have outbound protection, it does but yes it is default off
the important is inbound protection
If an application , let's say Iexplore.exe is allowed TCP 80 and 443 and another one , let's say virus.exe is using Iexplore.exe to connect to the internet, you will never get a notification or block from any "Windows Firewall" combination regarding virus.exe, which will connect to the internet behind your firewall.
if it detects something, in a way it’s already too late: your machine is infected.
Several AV vendors has droppet there own firewall because winfirewall is good enough (Webroot / Avira / Trend Micro / F-Secure ) and just add a network traffic scanner
Some info here https://askleo.com/is_an_outbound_firewall_needed/
Anyway it is of course evry users choise what hey want. In most cases users get tired of all the popup nags they dont understand didley about and end up saying yes to evrything
if it detects something, in a way it’s already too late: your machine is infected.
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I am not talking about an infection here; see a real life example:
Malwarebytes updates using Mbamservice.exe on dinamic IP’s so you need to allow it based on FQDN not IP.
At the same time Malwarebytes is “spying” on you by telemetry using Assistant.exe which will launch Mbamservice.exe
Without a proper firewall which can block these attempts and which can be set for dynamic IP, you cannot control these.
It is nothing malicious, only a privacy concern in the situation mentioned above.
Same here.
The windows firewall does ask you if you want to allow the connection the first time the connection is attempted.
Some folks still think that they can actually control their privacy. I’ve learned a long time ago that you already gave up
your privacy when you first discovered the internet especially here in the US.
