Longhorn Networking Stack: Firewall Platform

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Today was the Longhorn Networking Chat, I've organized some of the QA and will do a series of posts on different topics that came up. See the full transcript on Channel 9.

Firewall:

Henry_MSFT (Expert):
Q: Will Longhorn feature iptables like firewall with support for 3rd party plugins?

A: Support for 3rd party firewalls/filtering plugins will be available for the new Windows Filtering Platform.

Jawad_Khaki_MSFT (Expert):
Q: Tell us more about Longhorns' netowrking vision - and how it's gonna be secure

A: Our longterm vision is towards a seamless network that provides authenticated, authorized, private communications required for pervasive collaborative computing. IPSec and host-firewall are important aspects from a security standpoint.

Arvind_MSFT (Expert):
Q: Will the network stack be able to work at Layer2 and by the way provide and infrastructure for a future version of ISA working as a transparent Firewall ?

A: The LH network stack will operate over NDIS (IM) drivers at layer 2.

Arvind_MSFT (Expert):
Q: As I understand it, Windows Filtering Platform will expose a common filtering methods to 3rd party firewalls. Does this extend to improved logging functionality, either built in, or with a 3rd party tool?

A: There will be improved built-in logging functionality in Longhorn, and WFP will support logging by 3rd party products as well.

Henry_MSFT (Expert):
Q: How much easier will LH make firewall development? Will we get an up-to-date C++ interface to work with?

A: It will make it significantly easier. That's the whole goal of the WFP (Windows Filtering Platform) effort. There will be up to date, clearly documented interfaces. We're also investing in improving LSP and NDIS filter driver support, which are also often used by host firewalls.

Arvind_MSFT (Expert):
Q: What with the LH firewall, are you planning to make something like iptables?

A: Can you please elaborate on the functionality you are looking for?

Arvind_MSFT (Expert):
Q: When will we first get to play with WFP? WinHEC? PDC?

A: We plan to make WFP documentation and samples available with WinHEC.