Overriding Firewall White List

MalcolmD

How can I prevent a program listed in the white list from connecting to the Internet? For example, I really do not want Windows Media Player doing so. Call me paranoid but I prefer to control what gets permission and what doesn't. I've tried setting a "deny" rule but it doesn't seem to work.

alexcrist

Hello MalcolmD,

You can deny access to any application (whitelisted or not) by creating Deny rules. But for this, you have to make sure that there are no already-existing rules which grant access to the network.

So try deleting all rules for the Media Player process, then manually create a new rule for it, choosing Deny as action.

Also, you can set the BitDefender Firewall to Report (not on Allow known programs). This will make the Firewall ignore the whitelist and ask you about each and every network access request (which doesn't have a rule in the BitDefender Firewall list). Once a process is allowed or denied, a rule is created for it and future requests from that application will be allowed/blocked according to that rule.

Cris.

MalcolmD

Thank you, I will try that.

MalcolmD

OK, I tried the Report approach. It worked OK on my XP SP3 system but not on Vista 64. On that programs connect to the Internet even when the rule is set to deny. Are there other settings I should be aware of that could affect this?

alexcrist

Please find this file:

C:\Program Files\BitDefender\BitDefender 2010\Firewall\rules.xml

(assuming BitDefender is installed in C:\Program Files)

Upload the file on a file sharing server of your choice (like www.sendspace.com) and send me the download link by PM.

Cris.

MalcolmD

OK, I tried the Report approach. It worked OK on my XP SP3 system ...

Correction - yes, it works on my XP system in the sense that it blocks programs that I don't want to access the internet, but causes the computer to reboot when I run one of those programs!