What is a Firewall and why would you want to use it?
Whenever you connect to the Internet, you connect to another computer. In a
similar manner, a hacker is able to connect to your computer.
In the case of a private individual, it is often thought unnecessary to worry
about attack from malicious damage but Companies need to protect the information
contained on their computers.
In a system with no security in place, it is possible to connect to any machine
on a companies network through the machine connected to the Internet.
The technology used to prevent unauthorised access to your network is a
Firewall. This is either software or hardware based and has the ability to block
certain types of communications whilst allowing safe communications to continue.
Also see
Windows XP Firewall
