[Techtalk] Personal firewalls: helpful?

[Lucia Sanchez]

Kathryn Andersen wrote:
> Though I guess there's also two different kinds of "dedicated firewall"
> machines: there's the "let's go buy a firewall" machine (which speaks to
> point (1) above), and then there's the "oh, I'm a Linux hobbyist who has
> lots of old computers lying around, here, I'll turn this one into a
> firewall by installing Linux and just putting the minimal stuff on,
> including my favourite firewall software" firewall machine.  That speaks
> more to point (2) above.

What are the advantages to having a machine dedicated as a firewall?

It would seem logical that if the firewall's security is breached you're
in the same amount of trouble whether it's a dedicated machine or
not....  Of course assuming that the breach of security occurs because
of a failure of the firewall itself, not security holes from other
software running on that machine.

-- 
Lu.

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 I will live forever or die trying.
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