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Firewall is a software program or hardware device that monitors your computer’s network connection and blocks unwanted traffic from unrecognized sources like hackers and malware. It’s a first line of defense against cyberattacks, and without one your operating system, devices, and private data are left exposed to cybercriminals.

Cybercriminals work around the clock to develop new hacking tools to gain access to private data. Firewalls constantly sift through your data to identify threats and prevent cyberattacks by examining incoming or outgoing data packets based on pre-established security rules.

These rules are based on several aspects indicated by the data packets, such as their source, destination, content, etc. Depending on the rule set, firewalls either allow or deny the data packet. Usually, the most strict rules are defined for incoming data packets in order to protect against unauthorized access to operating systems and other applications and servers that may contain sensitive information like database servers and email servers.

Generally, there are two types of firewalls: network-based and host-based. Network-based firewalls are positioned between two or more networks and control the flow of data between them. They can be in the form of a hardware appliance, a virtual appliance or a software application that runs on general-purpose hardware.

Firewalls are also categorized as stateful or stateless, with stateful firewalls analyzing more data than their stateless counterparts. They examine each incoming or outgoing packet separately and maintain state information about them, which makes them more secure against attack vectors.