iSACA Cybersecurity Fundamentals Certification Practice Exam

Which of the following provides greater security than packet-filtering firewalls?

1. Circuit level gateways

2. Basic routers

3. Hardware firewalls

4. Software firewalls

The correct answer is: Circuit level gateways

Circuit-level gateways provide greater security than packet-filtering firewalls primarily because they operate at a higher level in the OSI model, specifically at the transport layer. Unlike packet-filtering firewalls, which inspect only the headers of packets to allow or deny traffic based on predefined rules, circuit-level gateways establish a connection between two parties and monitor the state of the connection, ensuring that only legitimate traffic is allowed. This monitoring capability allows circuit-level gateways to effectively verify the legitimacy of a communications session, offering a layer of security that packet-filtering firewalls do not possess. By maintaining the state of the connection and managing sessions, circuit-level gateways can detect and block attempts at unauthorized access that might bypass the simplistic checks of packet-filtering systems. While basic routers can perform some limited filtering, they do not provide the same level of inspection as circuit-level gateways. Hardware and software firewalls offer varying degrees of protection as well, but circuit-level gateways are distinguished by their ability to manage connection states, which significantly enhances security.