FAQ - Firewalls

Set your firewall to a Medium security setting that allows outgoing TCP connections through all ports, to any computer. This is often the default setting for personal firewalls and routers.
If the firewall product challenges PC2Me Server or PC2Me, choose to always allow it.

Note: Expect your firewall product to challenge PC2Me Server again after every PC2Me Server update.

Opening Ports
You do not need to open ports in order to use PC2Me Server. If your PC2Me Server status is "Online-Proxied", that means you have a useable connection to the Internet, with data passing through the 1stWorks proxy servers. However, you can choose to open a port in order to bypass our proxy servers, which should give you faster audio and desktop access. For information on opening ports, see Open Ports.

Security

1stWorks Corporation is aware that there are many viruses spread through open ports on computers and has taken significant precautions to filter any non-PC2Me Server messages to its open ports. Messages are not stored on the computer stack and therefore are not susceptible to execution upon overflow. If PC2Me Server receives incorrectly formatted transmissions it immediately closes the inbound ports and, if the sender is HTTP, returns an error to the sender.

How do I configure anything else?

Most router / modem / firewall manufacturers have websites that include answers to the question: "How do I open ports?" Often, the questions are asked by online gamers, so the questions might look like this: "How do I play (game name)?"

The words differ from vendor to vendor.

In general, to find information:

Find the website for the manufacturer of your router / modem / firewall.
Go to their Support area.
Find their FAQ (frequently asked questions) or Knowledgebase.
Search for any of these: "ports", "online gaming", "ICQ", "Netmeeting". Usually, you can find information on how to open up ports. In some cases, the information tells you what to do, but you need to look in the User's Manual to find out how to do it.

Agnitum Outpost firewall

The Agnitum Outpost firewall can prevent you from connecting from some rooms. If you get a "Referer Error while connecting to room" message, you can configure the firewall to eliminate the problem.

The following information is from Agnitum: http://www.agnitum.com/support/kb/article.php?id=1000098&lang=en

Some sites require that all or several of its active content elements be allowed to run for their pages to display or function correctly. If you make the settings for all sites very restrictive, you can experience the following problems: images not being displayed, a web page not showing at all, a web page displayed incorrectly or some useful services contained in applets not working. If this happens with only a few sites, add those sites to the exclusions lists of the Active Content and Ads plug-ins.

For the Active Content plug-in:

1. Right-click the Active Content plug-in name in the left panel of Outpost's main window and select Properties on the shortcut menu.

2. Select the Exclusions tab and click Add.

3. Specify the site address, for example, www.agnitum.com, and click OK. [For PC2Me Server, the site address is the relay server your room is on, such as: relay.ezpeer.net or relay10.ezpeer.net or DLR1.ezpeer.net]

4. Specify the settings for that site and click OK. [For PC2Me Server, click on Referrers and click Permit.

If this does not resolve the problem, please follow the instructions at http://www.agnitum.com/support/kb/article.php?id=1000106&lang=en

AVG

AVG may challenge PC2Me Server when PC2Me Server starts. If so, tell AVG to Allow All.

4/26/10 - If you do not tell AVG to allow PC2Me Server, your PC2Me Server may stay Signed out. To fix this:

Close PC2Me Server.
Open the AVG firewall settings
In the Firewall topic, choose Allow All.
When AVG acknowleges the change, re-start PC2Me Server.
PC2Me Server should change to Online.

Bordernet 2-way satellite

PC2Me Server interprets the BorderNet connection as a proxy server, and sets itself to be Online-Tunnelled. Users are able to connect, but find that audio is broken, they may have difficulty sending and receiving typed messages, and other symptoms of a poor connection.

Bordernet has some similarities to a proxy server, but you can set up exceptions so that you can connect directly to the PC2Me Server servers.

From a customer: "The exceptions are the exceptions to going through the proxy server. This is what the Bordernet people suggest trying since it would mean that the server would be going straight to the site and not through a proxy."

We gave him a list of addresses to put into Bordernet as exceptions. Then, in PC2Me Server, he clicked the Online-Tunnelled message, checked Directly, clicked OK, closed PC2Me Server, waited 20 seconds and restarted PC2Me Server.

The addresses we gave him were:
   relay.ezpeer.net
   relay-server.ezpeer.net
   vns2.PC2Me Server.com

where relay-server is the PC2Me Server relay his room is on.

CA Internet Security (Computer Associates)

4/26/10 - CA Internet Security does not usually prevent PC2Me Server from connecting to the 1stWorks NetWork.

If you have problems with CA Internet Security, please see the additional information available for our hotComm product at http://hotcomm.com/faq/faq_firewalls.asp#CA.

Etrust EZFirewall

EZFirewall is a branded version of Zone Alarm Pro. Please see our instructions for

Zone Alarm.

Note that if you are trying to set Private Header Information (Referer), you must use the instructions for adding a specific site to the Privacy Site list.

Information about EZFirewall is at www.my-etrust.com.

Fsecure

4/26/10 - F-secure does not usually prevent PC2Me Server from connecting to the 1stWorks NetWork.

If you have problems with F-Secure, please see the additional information available for our hotComm product at http://hotComm.com/FAQ/F-Secure.

Iolo Firewall and System Mechanic Professional

10/5/07 - we are currently working with Iolo technical support to determine how to configure the Iolo Firewall and System Mechanic Professional 7 to allow PC2Me Server to connect successfully.

Unfortunately, until this issue is resolved, you cannot run PC2Me Server while the Iolo product is installed. You must uninstall Iolo in order to run PC2Me Server.

1/21/08 - If you uninstall Iolo, and you still can't connect with PC2Me Server, please see instructions from Iolo on how to remove remnants of their software, in the FAQ DBA-01964 - I can't establish an Internet connection after uninstalling System Mechanic 7 Professional or iolo Personal Firewall, at http://www.iolo.com/customercare/kbarticle.aspx?id=KBA-01964

Norman Personal Firewall

This information comes from http://www.norman.com/Support/FAQs/Norman_Personal_Firewall/17734/en-us, through the following path: Support » Frequently Asked Questions » Norman Personal Firewall » What is a referrer, and how do I stop referrer blocking?

What is a referrer, and how do I stop referrer blocking?
Whenever you click on a link to go to a new web page, your browser automatically tells the new web site where you came from. This URL of the page you came from is known as the "referer" and is passed in a hidden part of the conversation between your browser and the web server providing the new page. This can be deemed to be an invasion of your privacy.

To disable referrer blocking, right click the NPF icon in your system tray and choose Block referrer and then choose No. This should resolve the problem you are having.

PCSecurityShield (The Shield Deluxe)

10/12/07 - The Shield Deluxe

The Shield Deluxe includes firewall features and is powered by Kaspersky. Please follow the directions in our article on Kaspersky for configuring The Shield Deluxe to allow both the initial connection to our location server and the secondary connections to the Files2Phones proxy servers, at http://www.myf2p.com/guide/firewalls/faq_kaspersky.asp.

Like Kaspersky, The Shield Deluxe asks if you want to allow PC2Me Server to access the Internet. You give it permission, and PC2Me Server makes the first connection, to our location server. Then, like Kaspersky, The Shield Deluxe blocks PC2Me Server from making the second connection to the proxy servers.

If you do not want to make a permanent configuration, you can pause The Shield Deluxe temporarily while Files2Phones connects. Once you have connected to the room successfully, you can re-enable The Shield Deluxe.

For more information on PCSecurityShield, see http://www.pcsecurityshield.com.

Rogers Yahoo! Online Protection

Rogers Yahoo! Online Protection includes Norton Personal Firewall 2006 Please see our instructions for

Norton firewalls.

Please see the Rogers tutorial for accessing the Norton Personal Firewall at http://help.yahoo.com/rogers/tutorials/olp2/firewall1.html.

Trend Micro PC-cillin and Trend Micro Internet Security

Also see information for our related hotComm product, at FAQ - TrendMicro Internet Security.

In general, PC2Me Server does not have problems with TrendMicro and PcCillin. Exceptions are below:

7/8/08 - In updating from revision 7.20 to 7.30, one customer reported that TrendMicro identified PC2Me Server as a virus threat and blocked it from connecting to the 1stWorks Network, and therefore remaining in "Signed Out" status. After working with TrendMicro support for several hours to configure TrendMicro to allow PC2Me Server, the customer decided to uninstall TrendMicro, uninstall hotComm, restart his computer, reinstall TrendMicro, and reinstall PC2Me Server. That worked and he was able to connect successfully.

From a customer (no date):

PC-cillin users may keep losing the PC2Me Server connection unless you configure PC-cillin as follows:

Open PC-cillin
Go to AntiPhishing & content protection
Un-check Filter Access to Web Sites

Information about PC-cillin is at www.pccillin.com.

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Updated: 5/14/10