What Do Firewalls Protect? An Empirical Study of Firewalls, Vulnerabilities, and Attacks

Citation

• S. Peisert, M. Bishop, and K. Marzullo, “What Do Firewalls Protect? An Empirical Study of Firewalls, Vulnerabilities, and Attacks”, Technical Report CSE-2010-8, Dept. of Computer Science, University of California at Davis, Davis, CA 95616-8562 (Mar. 2010).

Paper

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• Official copy (UC eScholarship)

Abstract

Firewalls are a cornerstone of how sites implement “defense in depth.” Many security policies assume that outside attackers must first penetrate a firewall configured to block their access. This paper examines what firewalls protect against, and whether those protections are sufficient to warrant placing the current level of trust in firewalls.

Background

This looks at how well firewalls worked, and what they protect against.