[PLUG] icq / firewalls / socks

[Darxus <darxus@op.net>]

Have any of you dealt with running ICQ through a firewall ?

I've recently resurected our firewall, and one of the results was one of
our users can nolonger use ICQ.  Apparently in an old incarnation of the
access list, incoming port 4000 udp (ICQ) connections were specifically
allowed to this particular user's workstation's IP.  I consider this bad
and unaceptable.

But this user happens to be a friend of mine, and I'd like to help her
out.  

There is a web page dedicated to dealing with firewalls & ICQ:
http://www.icq.com/firewall/

They have directions for the following situations:

I have no firewall. (You don't need any specific configuration). 
I have no Socks Proxy server 
I have no Socks Proxy server but I have a range of listening ports I can use 
I have a Socks4 compatible Firewall 
I have a Socks5 compatible Firewall 

"I have no Socks Proxy server" (http://www.icq.com/firewall/nosocks.html)
would seem to be the solution.  It says during this configuration that
"...incoming ports are needed only for communication with other users that
are behind a firewall."  So that would seem to be further evidence that it
should work.  But she still was unable to connect.

So the other potentially acceptable option is a proxy.  I've got several
Linux boxes around here, so this is quite doable.  But I'm not
particularly familiar with any security concerns that might come with
proxys (other than allowing access to everyone).  It sounds like this
somehow allows incoming connections.  But I would guess that it would only
allow it from incoming connections that the ICQ client had arranged,
otherwise how would the incoming connection be made ?

Do I want to allow ICQ via proxy ?

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            darxus@op.net / http://www.op.net/~darxus
        There is no fine line between genius and insanity.


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