The Network Security. Org

Using Netsh with Windows Firewall

This article examines how to configure and troubleshoot Windows Firewall using the Netsh command-line utility. The procedures covered apply to both the Windows XP Service Pack 2 and Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 operating system platforms.

I?ve always had a liking for homes built of brick. Besides having a kind of ?Lord of the Manor? appeal, they also look solidly built compared to many of today?s wood-framed plastic-siding homes. Brick also gives an added sense of security since, who?s going to smash through a brick wall to break into your house?

But then I wonder, wouldn?t your home be even more secure if all the rooms had brick walls and not just the exterior wall of your house? After all, drywall is so fragile you can punch through it if you get really angry (and don?t mind a bit of pain) so it seems like a good idea to make the internal walls brick also. That way if someone breaks into your house they still have to break into each individual room to find the safe where you keep your jewels.

Many corporate networks are just like this today?instead of relying only on a firewall at the perimeter (outside wall) of the network, there are firewalls installed on individual clients and servers (rooms) also to act as another layer of defense against attack. And on networks that run Windows XP on the clients and Windows Server 2003 on the servers, there?s a ready candidate for which host-based firewall to use: Windows Firewall. After all, it?s free!

Unfortunately having firewalls on clients and servers means extra management work as well, but Group Policy can handle that as far as Windows Firewall is concerned (another great reason for deploying Windows Firewall on hosts instead of third-party firewalls from other vendors). Still, there are times when you want to check or modify the configuration of Windows Firewall on some hosts because of problems of some sort, and the command-line tool Netsh.exe is just the thing to do this with. Using Netsh with Windows Firewall

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