My personal opinion is not hardware vs software, but what firewall is most secure. You can talk about PIX, CheckPoint, Linux with IPtables, IPchains and IPfilters but from a security point of view a pure application proxy is more secure. How many people can notice a 20 ms pause? If you want speed get a router with ACLS, that's what PIX is. All these stateful inspection/packet filter technolgies work at too low a level (layers 2-4) to provide enterprise security. For web servers, mail servers etc. you need layer 7 checking.
Phil Kramer, SANS GSEC Systems Solutions Technologies, LLC Phone: 615-646-5766 email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
