[WBEL-users] About security ?

[Jan-Albert van Ree]

On Monday 24 May 2004 10:57, Jean LEE wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I'm new to Whitebox and relatively new to Linux. I am studying what
> distribution I could use for my network and looking on White Box with
> care.
>
> The main question I have is : how is it about the security ?
> I want to use a Linux server as an internet server for my network and
> then only use IP-masquerade and a good Firewall with IP-tables on this
> server.
>
> Is WBEL well suited for these applications or is it better to buy RHEL
> (for a better security, better update times or some other reasons)? Or
> perhaps is there a better distribution than Redhat enterprise for this
> task......


I have been using Whitebox for such a setup as well, and it works just fine.

Most important wrt security are the firewall rules you put in place, and 
which services you run. I don't allow outside users to use my outgoing mail 
server, and all the incoming connections from the internet, apart from the 
webserver and the incoming mail, are encrypted to prevent password 
sniffing.

Security updates for whitebox are available usually within a couple of days 
after they appear for RHEL. I don't see any reason to prefer Whitebox over 
RHEL in this application. The only better solution might be some 
floppy-based router distro, since these are easier to safely configure. For 
instance look at Freesco.
-- 
Jan-Albert van Ree        | http://www.vanree.net/brickpiles/
VanReeDotNet IT Solutions | http://www.vanree.net
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