Get a FREE fully-working copy of Steganos Security Suite 7 (worth £49.99) when you sign up to the Practical PC Newsletter. Review: R-Firewall
Don Bradbury looks at a free software firewall from RT Technology
| Product | R-Firewall |
|---|---|
| Company | RT-Technology |
| Web | www.r-tt.com |
| Price | Free |
| We like | Comprehensive options, choice of view |
| We don't like | Instability; security in doubt after ShieldsUP test |
| Rating | 4/10 |
| Requirements |
Software firewalls that are free to home users are available on the web, but finding a good example might be difficult. We looked at one offering that's the creation of RT Technology, called R-Firewall, downloadable from www.r-tt.com.
Comprehensive in what it claims to protect the user from, and while some arcane terminology is unavoidable, relatively easy to set up and use, the product appeared to be a welcome alternative to the long-established Zone Alarm. The latter is a product that Practical PC has recommended for several years, though with increasing comment from certain quarters about usability in recent versions, leaving some to search for alternative protection from Hackers, Trojans and the like.
In R-Firewall, two views of your applications and rules setup are offered, namely simple and advanced. While most will be happy to use the simple view, advanced view gives more comprehensive detail. Simple view just lets you set the security level for the application, and over-ride the default activity.
Advanced view gives more detail of the protective cover you (or the program's default) have set up. A choice of low, medium, or hight (sic) security may be selected for any application the program detects during installation.
A welcome addition is the Content Filter, where the sections of online activity indicated in the graphic below may be set.
In Use
In use, we have to report that R-Firewall left rather a lot to be desired. It's instability was apparent as we used it, and when we ran the Gibson Research ShieldsUP test, it demonstrated fallibility in that several ports were reported as being open, causing it to fail this comprehensive security test.
Worse, the ShieldsUP test put R-Firewall out of memory on the test PC; we had to reboot to establish it in the list of running applications, or restart it from the Start/Programs menu.
Finally, after a second ShieldsUP run with increased security set, the program crashed out once again, simultaneously losing all our application setting while restoring its own defaults upon rebooting. A request to send a copy of R-Firewall's logs to RT Technology for analysis elicited the response that this early version had not been updated for some years and was to be installed at user's risk.
In conclusion
We really cannot recommend R-Firewall as your principal source of online protection against Hackers and Trojans. It needs further development, more guidance on option selection, and a more friendly face. The version we tried really ought to be taken down from the web site until the extra development it sorely needs has taken place. A promising start though, especially by way of content filtering.
