Outpost Firewall Pro 2.5 - part II

by Andrew Cooper

Testing the program

The first thing I did was to run leak tests on my test machine, an AMD powered, Windows XP Professional computer with XP Service Pack 2.

It was blown away when I watched the program working exactly the way it should, promptly fending off each type of attempted attack as simulated by the leak tests. This means that every hacker foray involving any of the techniques employed by those leak tests (at least 12 different attack algorithms) will be successfully fended off. The program passed even the most strenuous Thermite and Copycat leak tests, which were unstoppable when we compared a dozen or so major firewalls in our previous leak test roundup!



Someone once said that you could judge the strength of a thing by its weakness, and on this account the Outpost is extremely strong!

New features

Another interesting addition to the program is its Attack Detection module, which recently has garnered much user acclaim. You can find a lot of goodies there, such as a list of attack types the application should block (including prevention of DoS attacks, a much talked about threat these days).



There's also a button that allows users to enumerate vulnerable ports and protocols that should be given extra attention by the program, so that any malicious data traveling through them will never reach their destination, the port being closed off by the plug-in before those packets are forwarded.



There's even an option to specify which ports and Internet hosts (remote websites) will be excluded from being scrutinized by the program, just in case the user is advanced enough to be able to identify them himself.

This module is really like an extra program built into the main one, in itself sufficient to negate many attacks. I can't remember having seen a program as versatile as Outpost has become.

The program has other new and interesting features that enhance its overall performance and ease-of-use. I will briefly list them here, letting you check them out yourself.

I liked the point that allows users to download a continually revised list of advertisement keywords to be blocked by the Ads plug-in, I also very much appreciate the presets that facilitate easy and problem-free program configuration while working in a Windows domain (for those folks who work on complex network-spanned PCs) and liked the revamped Content plug-in.

To conclude my brief article, I'd say that Outpost has definitely set a new standard and has become the personal firewall software for other companies to try to beat. Every single detail related to security has been addressed so Outpost can truly make your computer system an unassailable fortress. Definitely two thumbs way up. For a real high, set aside a bit of time and check out the new Outpost.

Verdict



The program is perfect, a 10 out of 10. It's user-friendly and intuitive. Home users can comfortably expect very reliable protection, and people who are interconnected over networks of computers need worry no longer. The month trial period lets users fully examine its performance and features before making a purchase decision.

I was so impressed with Outpost while testing it against the leak tests that I decided to put the whole lineup of major firewalls through the same tests and find who comes out on top. The results will be in the forthcoming Personal Firewalls vs Leak Tests roundup.

Developer's web site: http://www.agnitum.com
Download link: http://www.agnitum.com/download

Back to Part I