Modems have a web-based interface which allows you to view information about the status of your modem including signal strength and quality as well as logs about the connectivity to your ISP. The information can be a useful diagnostic tool when troubleshooting various issues. You may also view the firmware version to see if you are using the latest version.
The IP address to access the modem’s web interface is often 192.
The topic of reverse proxies can be difficult or confusing to understand when you are new to the concept. Understanding when you might want to use a reverse proxy may be more difficult than understanding how it functions as you build out a more advanced home network. I had considered using a reverse proxy in my network for a while but did not take the time to explore the idea until now.
The Internet is full of malicious actors looking to take advantage of insecure networks and devices. While corporate and government targets may be the biggest targets because of the valuable data they possess, home users still need to be cautious. Phishing attacks usually via email is the most common attack for home users. Fortunately, those attacks are typically easy to avoid by alert users who do not blindly click every attachment and web link contained in their emails.
When you first learned to write firewall rules in OPNsense, you may have simply used the pre-defined aliases for the network interfaces/ports and IP addresses such as “LAN net”, “LAN interface”, “HTTP”, “HTTPS”, etc. You may not have even realized you were using aliases since they do not appear in the list on the “Aliases” page. Using the predefined aliases is not only convenient but helps make your rules easier to understand (imagine having a large number of rules and seeing only IP/network addresses).
When looking up information on how to write firewall rules in OPNsense, you may be looking for specific examples on how to block or allow certain types of network traffic rather than how to write firewall rules in general. This is especially true once you become more experienced and comfortable with writing rules. I thought it would be a good idea to consolidate a variety of scenarios into a single how-to that could be used as a quick reference guide.
