Any computer connected to the Internet, by default, becomes a potential target for malware that will try to penetrate your computer by any means, as soon as you visit an infected site. To protect against these threats, a firewall was developed. Sometimes a firewall does not help, but only harms, but more on that later. Moreover, the firewall, how to disable which we will learn later, is still mostly useful. But let’s first try to figure out what it is – a firewall, how it works and why it is needed at all.
Fire wall, or Enemies won’t get through
"Fire wall" – what is it about and what is it for, if we are talking about software. Do not rush to be surprised, everything is logical here – this is exactly what the words firewall and firewall mean. It is only worth noting that the first word came to us from German, while the second from English. A fire wall is a special blank, fire-resistant wall that prevents the spread of fire during a fire. Interesting analogy, right? This is what a computer firewall does.
A firewall or firewall is a software package designed to protect a computer from network attacks, which works on the principle of a filter and allows only safe objects to enter the PC. At the same time, the firewall monitors all potentially dangerous connections and blocks them, thereby reliably protecting the user’s personal data. However, do not confuse a firewall (this is another name for a firewall) with an antivirus. Antivirus applications are designed to deal with threats that are already located on a PC or on removable media. They cannot prevent viruses from entering, they prevent them from running and doing malicious activity. At the same time, antiviruses are powerless against network attacks. Firewalls, on the other hand, do not monitor what is happening on the computer itself (unless, of course, this is something that transmits information to the network). Their main task is to track exactly network traffic. Only their joint use can guarantee the complete security of the PC.
As you can see, this application is the very fire wall of your personal data house. It works imperceptibly for you, and it brings a lot of benefits. Why, according to statistics, a computer without a firewall on the Internet remains “clean" for an average of about two minutes. Just think, 2 minutes – and the computer is infected. However, sometimes there are cases when you have to turn off the firewall. Such cases include, for example:
- A weak computer that is not able to provide parallel operation of applications and a firewall.
- Illiterately selected settings that led to the erroneous operation of the firewall (sometimes to the point that the Internet stops working).
- Installing a third party firewall. Quite often, third-party developments in this field turn out to be more effective, and two firewalls in parallel cannot work without conflicts.
And in such cases, we willy-nilly have to turn it off. For those who don’t know how to do this, disabling the firewall can be a big problem. Okay, at work – at least there is someone who will tell you. And at home? And we will tell you at home. So let’s get started. What is your operating system?
And how to turn it off?
A small caveat – when talking about how to disable the Windows 7 firewall, we automatically mean both Windows Vista and the newfangled Windows 8. The fact is that in many respects they are very similar, so you can disable the firewall in them in the same way. So, to completely disable the firewall, we have to go through three steps.
Stage one. Shutdown
To do this, you need to launch the control panel. It is available in the start menu and provides access to settings and tools for working with Windows. If you do not know what this or that control panel item means, then it is better not to touch it – this is fraught with a complete or partial failure of the operating system. If you are a Windows 8 user, then move the mouse to the upper right corner of the screen and in the menu that appears on the right, select the search item and write the control panel. After that, go to the application section and there you will see the necessary item. By the way, if you intend to use the control panel often, then pin the icon to the start screen. But this is off topic. Is everyone in now? Excellent. Let’s continue. We need a control panel item called "Windows Firewall". In the left menu, select the "Turn Windows Firewall on or off" section.
Stage two. Turn off the service
We have disabled the application, now we need to disable the firewall service. To do this, we launch the “Run” service window, which is called using the “Win + R” key combination. In the window that appears, write "services.msc", run it and get into the services control panel. Here we need to find a service that is called “Windows Firewall”. We stop the service. It is quite simple to do this – on the left there is a special item responsible for this action.
Stage three. Disable autoload
This is necessary so that the Windows Firewall service does not start every time the system starts. This is done quite simply. We again need to call the "Run" window (Win + R for those who forgot). We write "msconfig" and press "Enter". We need a service tab. There we find the "Windows Firewall" service and uncheck the box next to this item. Click "apply", close, and then at will – reboot or not.
All firewall removed. Just do not forget to install a third-party firewall, unless, of course, its removal is due to the fact that the computer “does not pull”. Statistics don’t lie, so remember those two minutes. By the way, if you are wondering how to disable the WindowsXP firewall, then the option described above is quite suitable for you. The only point is that in some versions of XP, the firewall may be disabled by default.
Is it necessary?
So, we already know what a firewall is, in what cases it has to be turned off and how exactly to do it. It remains to solve only one small question – is it necessary to turn off the firewall. The answer is obvious. Unnecessarily – by no means. It has to be disabled in some cases. But it doesn’t have to be done just to improve performance a bit – computer security is not a price worth paying for a bit of RAM. Moreover, network threats will load your PC so much that you will not be happy.
If you are not satisfied with the standard firewall, you can always change it to a third-party one, but completely disabling it and working without a firewall is very dangerous. By the way, about third-party firewalls – the best solution in the organization of complex security will be the use of complex software tools that combine anti-virus software, an anti-spam filter and a firewall. Only in this case you will be able to get a truly comprehensive and comprehensive protection.