Thus, the router sends and receives networking traffic from the modem with one connection and routes all that data through its four Ethernet ports and through the air via the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands.

Though honestly, pretty much any PC with multiple NICs can function as a firewall. Up until this year, I had a Pentium 3 800mhz box as my firewall running OpenBSD on it.

The router forwards traffic to the modem that is destined for the Internet, while keeping internal traffic (computer to computer, computer to printer, etc.) inside the network.

How the router works A router creates a local access network (LAN) that connects devices by forwarding “data packets” between them, according to MakeUseOf, a site devoted to consumer tech.

Q: I’ve become increasingly paranoid about my home network security and am wondering what a firewall is and whether I should enable the one on my router? Dave Taylor A: It’s always good when ...