Firewall vs entry in Hosts file ????
What is the difference (that is better) between having an entry in the "hosts" file, or a "rule" in a firewall application when trying to block inbound traffic from a known website or company.
Forum Discussion
fj12ryder wrote:
Yeah, using the "hosts file" was an old trick from waaaaay back. I think it was of use with Windows 98.
Actually, the hosts file came into the Windows world via Windows NT 3.1 who's development was strongly influenced by ("ripped off from?" :) ) DEC VMS, which was a parallel OS challenger to AT&T (Bell Labs) UNIX, which first introduced the etc/hosts file (HOSTS.TXT) that was part of the whole DNS system.
In the "learn something new every day" department, I've never heard of using the hosts file to deny or block routing ... I've only used it to define routing to an IP or host without depending on DNS ...
Greg
