D-Link DFL-260 Product Manual - Page 119

IP Rule Actions, Stateful Inspection, The First Matching Principle, Non-matching Traffic

Page 119 highlights

3.5.3. IP Rule Actions Chapter 3. Fundamentals Firewall, the list of IP rules are evaluated from top to bottom until a rule that matches the parameters of the new connection is found. The first matching rule's Action is then performed. If the action allows it then the establishment of the new connection will go ahead. A new entry or state representing the new connection will then be added to the NetDefendOS internal state table which allows monitoring of opened and active connections passing through the NetDefend Firewall. If the action is Drop or Reject then the new connection is refused. Tip: Rules in the wrong order sometimes cause problems It is important to remember the principle that NetDefendOS searches the IP rules from top to bottom, looking for the first matching rule. If an IP rule seems to be ignored, check that some other rule above it isn't being triggered first. Stateful Inspection After initial rule evaluation of the opening connection, subsequent packets belonging to that connection will not need to be evaluated individually against the rule set. Instead, a highly efficient algorithm searches the state table for each packet to determine if it belongs to an established connection. This approach is known as stateful inspection and is applied not only to stateful protocols such as TCP but also by means of "pseudo-connections" to stateless protocols such as UDP and ICMP. This approach means that evaluation against the IP rule set is only done in the initial opening phase of a connection. The size of the IP rule set consequently has negligible effect on overall throughput. The First Matching Principle If several rules match the same parameters, the first matching rule in a scan from top to bottom is the one that decides how the connection will be handled. The exception to this is SAT rules since these rely on a pairing with a second rule to function. After encountering a matching SAT rule the search will therefore continue on looking for a matching second rule. See Section 7.4, "SAT" for more information about this topic. Non-matching Traffic Incoming packets that do not match any rule in the rule set and that do not have an already opened matching connection in the state table, will automatically be subject to a Drop action. To have control over non-matching traffic it is recommended to create an explicit rule called DropAll as the final rule in the rule set with an action of Drop with Source/Destination Network all-nets and Source/Destination Interface all. This allows logging to be turned on for traffic that matches no IP rule. 3.5.3. IP Rule Actions A rule consists of two parts: the filtering parameters and the action to take if there is a match with those parameters. As described above, the parameters of any NetDefendOS rule, including IP rules are: • Source Interface • Source Network • Destination Interface 119

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Firewall, the list of IP rules are evaluated from top to bottom until a rule that matches the parameters
of the new connection is found. The first matching rule's
Action
is then performed.
If the action allows it then the establishment of the new connection will go ahead. A new entry or
state
representing the new connection will then be added to the NetDefendOS internal
state table
which allows monitoring of opened and active connections passing through the NetDefend Firewall.
If the action is
Drop
or
Reject
then the new connection is refused.
Tip: Rules in the wrong order sometimes cause problems
It is important to remember the principle that NetDefendOS searches the IP rules from
top to bottom, looking for the first matching rule.
If an IP rule seems to be ignored, check that some other rule above it isn't being
triggered first.
Stateful Inspection
After initial rule evaluation of the opening connection, subsequent packets belonging to that
connection will not need to be evaluated individually against the rule set. Instead, a highly efficient
algorithm searches the state table for each packet to determine if it belongs to an established
connection.
This approach is known as
stateful inspection
and is applied not only to stateful protocols such as
TCP but also by means of "pseudo-connections" to stateless protocols such as UDP and ICMP. This
approach means that evaluation against the IP rule set is only done in the initial opening phase of a
connection. The size of the IP rule set consequently has negligible effect on overall throughput.
The First Matching Principle
If several rules match the same parameters, the first matching rule in a scan from top to bottom is
the one that decides how the connection will be handled.
The exception to this is
SAT
rules since these rely on a pairing with a second rule to function. After
encountering a matching
SAT
rule the search will therefore continue on looking for a matching
second rule. See
Section 7.4, “SAT”
for more information about this topic.
Non-matching Traffic
Incoming packets that do not match any rule in the rule set and that do not have an already opened
matching connection in the state table, will automatically be subject to a
Drop
action. To have
control over non-matching traffic it is recommended to create an explicit rule called
DropAll
as the
final rule in the rule set with an action of
Drop
with Source/Destination Network
all-nets
and
Source/Destination Interface
all
. This allows logging to be turned on for traffic that matches no IP
rule.
3.5.3. IP Rule Actions
A rule consists of two parts: the filtering parameters and the action to take if there is a match with
those parameters. As described above, the parameters of any NetDefendOS rule, including IP rules
are:
Source Interface
Source Network
Destination Interface
3.5.3. IP Rule Actions
Chapter 3. Fundamentals
119