This week’s featured project of the week is pfSense, a free network firewall distribution. It is based on the FreeBSD operating system, includes a custom kernel and provides the same or more functionality of common commercial firewalls with no artificial limitations.
It is currently used around the world from companies like Check Point, Cisco PIX, Cisco ASA, Juniper, Sonicwall, Netgear and Watchguard.
“pfSense software includes a web interface for the configuration of all included components. There is no need for any UNIX knowledge, no need to use the command line for anything, and no need to ever manually edit any rule sets. Users familiar with commercial firewalls catch on to the web interface quickly, though there can be a learning curve for users not familiar with commercial-grade firewalls,” according to its GitHub page.
Other features include firewall and router capabilities, IPv6 support, multiple tunnels, local user authentication, intrusion prevention, enterprise reliability, local user and group databases, and proxy and content filtering.
The platform also includes secure networking through load balancing, traffic shaping, captive portal, UTM device, DNS/DHCP server, IPS, transparent caching proxy and web content filter.
“Thousands of businesses, educational institutions, government agencies and non-profits – on all seven continents, and for years – have come to rely upon pfSense software for their secure networking needs. For organizations in search of sub-10 Gbps performance, flexible 3rd-party application options, traditional management mechanisms, proven reliability, and access to business assurance support options, pfSense software is the perfect answer,” according to its website.
