Stateful Firewall operates at the highest level of the OSI Model.
The OSI Model has seven levels. There were early attempts to get a firewall that would produce or operate at the level 7 mark on the OSI model. It is also known as the Application Layer. The Stateful Firewall can also be called the stateful packet inspection or SPI. It is a firewall that will track the network connections such as the TCP streams or UDP communication. Only packets that are known on an active connection can pass through the firewall. The others are rejected.
- Stateful Firewall
The OSI Model has seven levels. There were early attempts to get a firewall that would produce or operate at the level 7 mark on the OSI model. It is also known as the Application Layer. The Stateful Firewall can also be called the stateful packet inspection or SPI. It is a firewall that will track the network connections such as the TCP streams or UDP communication. Only packets that are known on an active connection can pass through the firewall. The others are rejected.
- Most Firewalls
Most firewalls on computers are going to operate at level 3. It takes less memory and work for the computer to operate at this level. This is why most home computers are on the level 3 of any computer model. It is also a reason that they can get broken by the right hacker or download.
- Pitfalls of Stateful Firewall
There are issues with the stateful firewall. It is not compatible with the latest Linux, Windows 7 or Windows Vista especially for use with the TCP window scaling. There are also some vulnerabilities with this firewall in that an individual protocol decoder can allow an attacker in and gain control over the firewall. It is one reason why a person needs to continuously run software updates.
- OSI Model
The OSI Model is an open systems interconnection model. It is part of the project to make software open source and the internet as a whole an open system. It is to help international communications via the web such as systems like VoiP. This is why a stateful firewall can be most helpful despite the vulnerabilities and pitfalls that can be found within the system.