Midnight Mick Posted January 24, 2008 Share Posted January 24, 2008 (edited) I've noticed many comments regarding Vista firewall and the difficulty it is for user's to set outbound blocking on specific programs of their choice that like to "phone home", with most people looking to third party alternative's. Setting Vista firewall outbound blocking is actually very easy as long as you know what you want to block it in the first place as you get no warning that there is an outbound connection in most cases (unlike third party firewalls). Anyway, on with the guide... For this guide I will be using a piece of software called "Neutron" which is a very simple and small time synchronizing program that retrieves the accurate time from one of several specialized time servers on the Internet. Link: http://keir.net/neutron.html I will be blocking it having access to the internet. 1: Within the start menu (Search) please type "wf.msc" then select the program within the start menu. You could drag this icon to the desktop or elsewhere and make a shortcut for this program. "UAC" will jump in by default and ask you if you really wish to run this program, select "Yes". 2: "Windows Firewall With Advanced Security" will now load. 3: Within the left hand side you will notice "Outbound Rules", please select this, then select "New Rule" from the right side. 4: This starts the "New Outbound Rule Wizard", please select "Program" then press "Next". 5: Next, select the program's path then press "Next". 6: Ensuring that "Block the connection" is selected, press "Next". 7: Apply this rule to all three choices - "Domain", "Private" and "Public" (All three all selected by default), select "next" to continue. 8: Give this rule a title (required) and a description (Optional) and select "Finish". 9: Finally, a new rule has been created which blocks all outbound connections for the program I selected. 10: Proof! You can easily delete any rule you have created simply by "Right clicking" on it & selecting "Delete". I hope this guide was helpful to you. :) Edited January 25, 2008 by Midnight Mick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ManMountain Posted January 25, 2008 Share Posted January 25, 2008 I just set Vista's firewall to globally block all inbound and outbound connections that do not match a rule. For programs that I wish net access, I create the appropriate in/out rule. The added benefit being that absolutely nothing has network access without my first creating a rule to allow it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
random_n Posted January 25, 2008 Share Posted January 25, 2008 The Vista firewall quite impressed me when I turned it all the way up, and it blocked DHCP responses. I look forward to using it with Server 2008 and (more than likely at this rate) Windows NT 7. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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