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You can use a firewall to protect your home network and family from offensive Web sites and potential hackers.
Basically, a firewall is a barrier to keep destructive forces away from your property. In fact, that's why it’s called a firewall. Its job is similar to a physical firewall that keeps a fire from spreading from one area to the next.

 Packet filter: Looks at each packet entering or leaving the network and accepts or rejects it based on user-defined rules. Packet filtering is fairly effective and transparent to users, but it is difficult to configure. In addition, it is susceptible to IP spoofing

 Application gateway: Applies mechanisms to specific applications, such as FTP and Telnet servers. This is very effective, but can impose performance degradation.

 Circuit-level gateway: Applies security mechanisms when a TCP or UDP connection is established. Once the connection has been made, packets can flow between the hosts without further checking.

 Proxy server: Intercepts all messages entering and leaving the network. The proxy server effectively hides the true network addresses.

In practice, many firewalls use two or more of these techniques in concert. A firewall is considered a first line of defence in protecting private information. For greater security, data can be encrypted.