Chapter 9: Gateway to Internet

Overview

You already know how to install and configure a Linux server, secure its connection, and enable the main services. But such services as a Web server and email are used on more than the local network. The maximum advantages materialize when integrated with the World Wide Web.

But it's a dangerous world out there on the Internet. You can run into all kinds of people and learn that life is not a bowl of cherries. Along with law- abiding Internet denizens, evil hackers lurk online.

You have to learn to protect your computer from them. When you build an office or some other building, you make its walls strong enough to resist attempts to break through. The doors must keep dishonest people out. Finally, you equip the finished building with an alarm system.

You have already built your computer walls and taken care to make them strong by securing your local network. Now you have to install doors to enter the network from the outside: the Internet. The door to the World Wide Web in a computer building will play the roles of gateway and proxy server. These are what will be considered in this chapter. In addition to configuring the server, the client has to be configured.

After making sure that the doors are up to snuff, you will install the alarm system: utilities to monitor network traffic activities and to detect unauthorized activities at the doors and in the building. These will be considered in Chapter 12 .