Hello Steve, First of all I recommend you subscribe to suse-security@suse.com. You will get more help. Second, a short answer... Basically everything connected to the out world is open to everyone. Even if you think your samba, your telnet, whatever services you are running, are secured with uuser login and so on... don't rely. Just a few services are secure enough (e.g. SSH). On Friday 19 April 2002 10:39, steve wrote:
Hi everyone.
We are a small international school with 22 computers on a lan with 7.3, samba, squid and a fast adsl internet connection. We cannot get SuSE firewall2 to let anything happen at all. It blocks everything. Everything works perfectly without the firewall. We have to make a decision soon as to the amount of time spent trying to get the firewall working (thanks to the patience of all on a related thread on this list) and whether we need it or not.
What will happen if we don't have it?
Don't wanna scare you at all.. I don't know what will happen. I know what could happen. Some people can get inside your server and benefit from your server / ADSL connection. Possible applications area: - Sending SPAM from your server - Place FTP server full pornography - Use your computer to attack other computers ... And once someone has access to the server that is connected to Internet and to your local network they can start playing with your school network (e.g. sniffing your internal network). I don't think yours is a simpe home network. I recommend you get fast a good book on internet security and firewalls or a security consultant. Regards, Pep Serrano.