Firewall Questions

[Colin Law]

On 6 October 2014 20:27, Jay Ridgley <jridgley2 at austin.rr.com> wrote:
> Folks,
>
> I have my wired network secured with ufw. However, I am wondering about my
> laptop which is connected wirelessly via an access point. It is, however,
> sometimes used in a more public setting. Correct me if I am mistaken about
> it being safe on my wired network without ufw running on it.
>
> Should I run ufw on it as well? If so, can I use the default configuration
> that is present on it? Will there be a problem when it is running behind my
> home network as a wireless device?

As Christian has said there is no such thing as absolute security.
However if what you are concerned about is the 'casual' hacker (rather
than someone specifically targeting yourself) then if you follow a few
rules you should be ok.
1.  Do not enable the root account.
2. If you have installed an ssh server (openssh-server for example)
then disable login via username/password so that only access by keys
is allowed.
3. Don't install samba (or if you must, then make sure any shares are
well protected with passwords).
4. Take care about what you do when using a public wifi connection.
Remember that if the connection has been compromised that someone
could be watching the traffic between yourself and the internet.  Also
there have been cases, I believe, of a hacker spoofing websites in
order to get passwords etc.

Any other suggestions from others?

Colin