The XG Series of firewalls come pre-loaded with the Sophos Firewall OS to provide optimal performance to meet today's network security requirements, including our revolutionary Security Heartbeat™, full web application firewall, and complete email anti-spam, encryption and DLP. If there is multiple firewall rules from VPN to LAN zones, then put the above firewall rule at the top of the list as described in Sophos XG Firewall: How to change firewall rule order. It is possible for the remote host to access the internet via the XG Firewall. Sophos Next Generation Firewall XG 125 is ideal for Small Businesses and branch offices at excellent price-to-performance ratio Work with software modules (to be ordered) for the security features. Firewall: 5 Gpbs, VPN: 410 Mbps, NGFW(IPS+App Ctrl): 360 Mbps, AV Proxy: 590 Mbps.
Sophos XG Firewall provides comprehensive next-generation firewall protection that exposes hidden risks, blocks unknown threats, and automatically responds to incidents.
Exposes hidden risks
Sophos XG Firewall provides unprecedented visibility into top risk users, unknown apps, advanced threats, suspicious payloads and much more. You also get rich on-box reporting included at no extra charge and the option to add Sophos iView for centralized reporting across multiple firewalls.
Blocks unknown threats
Sophos XG Firewall provides all the latest advanced technology you need to protect your network from ransomware and advanced threats including top-rated IPS, Advanced Threat Protection, Cloud Sandboxing, Dual AV, Web and App Control, Email Protection and a fullfeatured Web Application Firewall. And it's easy to setup and manage.
Automatically responds to incidents
XG Firewall is the only network security solution that is able to fully identify the source of an infection on your network and automatically limit access to other network resources in response. This is made possible with our unique Sophos Security Heartbeat™ that shares telemetry and health status between Sophos endpoints and your firewall.
Potent, powerful… fast
We've engineered XG Firewall to deliver outstanding performance and security efficiency for the best return on your investment. Our appliances are built using Intel multi-core technology, solid-state drives, and accelerated in-memory content scanning. In addition, Sophos FastPath packet optimization technology ensures you'll always get maximum throughput.
Simply manage multiple firewalls
Sophos Central is the ultimate cloud-management platform – for all your Sophos products. It makes day-to-day setup, monitoring, and management of your XG Firewall easy. It also provides helpful features such as alerting, backup management, one-click firmware updates and rapid provisioning of new firewalls. Optionally, Sophos Firewall Manager (SFM) provides powerful multi-device management tools for easy provisioning of consistent policies across your entire estate. And if you also want to consolidate reporting across multiple XG, SG, and Cyberoam appliances you can easily do that with Sophos iView.
Security features you can't get anywhere else
XG Firewall includes a number of innovations that not only make your job a lot easier, but also ensure your network is more secure.
Synchronized Security
An industry first, Synchronized Security links your endpoints and your firewall to enable unique insights and coordination. Security Heartbeat™ relays Endpoint health status and enables your firewall to immediately identify and respond to a compromised system on your network. The firewall can isolate systems until they can be investigated and cleaned up. Another Synchronized Security feature, Synchronized App Control, also enables the firewall to query the endpoint to determine the source of unknown traffic on the network.
Unified Firewall Rules
User identity takes enforcement to a whole new layer with our identity based policy technology enabling user level controls over applications, bandwidth and other network resources regardless of IP-address, location, network or device. It literally takes firewall policy to a whole new layer.
A Firewall That Thinks Like You
Pre-defined policy templates let you protect common applications like Microsoft Exchange or SharePoint quickly and easily. Simply select them from a list, provide some basic information and the template takes care of the rest. It sets all the inbound/outbound firewall rules and security settings for you automatically – displaying the final policy in a statement in plain English.
Insights into Top Risk Users
The Sophos User Threat Quotient (UTQ) indicator is a unique feature which provides actionable intelligence on user behavior. Our firewall correlates each user's surfing habits and activity with advanced threat triggers and history to identify users with risk-prone behavior.
Flexible deployment, no compromise
Unlike our competitors, whether you choose hardware, software, virtual or Microsoft Azure, we don't make you compromise – every feature is available on every model and form-factor.
XG Firewall makes it simple to get up and running quickly with the best network visibility, protection, and response in the industry. We make it easy to protect your network across multiple sites while also enabling access for your remote workers.
Getting started
Deployment
If you just received your XG Firewall, run through the convenient XG Firewall setup wizard which will have you up and running in a few minutes with essential protection for your network.
If you are running two XG Firewall appliances in High Availability mode for maximum business continuity, then be sure to take advantage of the new Quick HA option in v18.
INSTRUCTIONS: ‘How to deploy in gateway mode' ► VIDEO ‘Registration and setup wizard' ►
Get familiar with XG firewall
After the initial setup, review our extensive library of Getting Started How-To videos and the Documentation for XG Firewall. There's also a great list of articles and videos to review on the Initial Setup Community Forum.
Periodic best practices checkup
To ensure your XG Firewall is protecting your network optimally, follow these best practices after initial setup or periodically.
If you don't have time to perform these steps, the Sophos Professional Services team of network experts is available to help ensure your firewall is configured optimally. Contact them at professionalservices@sophos.com.
Double check your protection licenses
On your XG Firewall go to Administration > Licensing and ensure you have these essential network protection subscriptions:
- Network Protection – Essential for IPS, advanced threat protection, and botnet protection
- Web Protection – Essential for web security and control and application control
- Sandstorm Protection – Essential for the latest threat protection using artificial intelligence and sandboxing analysis
- Email Protection – Essential for anti-spam and phishing attack protection
- Web Server Protection – Essential if you have any servers that require public internet access
Update firmware
Always keep your firmware up to date to ensure you have the latest security, performance, and reliability updates. You can get the latest v18 release for your XG Firewall from MySophos.
INSTRUCTIONS: ‘How to download firmware updates' ► VIDEO: ‘Firmware update and roll-back' ►
Firewall rule and protection policy recommendations
Of course, by design, your firewall blocks all network traffic – your network is completely locked down – but you enable traffic to flow by creating firewall rules.
Firewall rules enable your network to function, but they also create opportunities for hackers, ransomware, and malware to enter. Hence, it's essential to protect your network by applying security policies to these firewall rules.
If you're new to XG Firewall or v18, check out the introductory video on Firewall Rules and the What's new in v18 for Firewall Rules video.
If your firewall has been running for a while, you may have dozens or even hundreds of firewall rules you've added over time. It's very important that you periodically review all your firewall rules to ensure that there are no avoidable 'openings' in your network. Ensure you don't have any unnecessary or unused rules that are presenting openings that hackers can take advantage of.
Start by checking the ‘Active firewall rules' widget on the Control Center to identify unused rules:
Then, go through your firewall rules to examine all the active rules to ensure they are needed and proper protection is being applied.
In particular, disable all non-essential port-forwarding rules, and re-evaluate if any of the port-forwarding rules you have can be better accommodated via VPN access or, at the very least, multifactor authentication.
Exposed services and servers through port forwarding are one of the top ways hackers breach your network. VPN and MFA provide much better security for remote access to internal network resources.
If you are on v17.x we suggest you upgrade to v18 for the latest NAT rule enhancements. If you are on v18 already, review all your NAT rules to ensure all are required and adequately protected by a corresponding firewall rule.
Make sure you're applying essential protection to all your firewall rules. XG Firewall makes it super easy to assign web protection and control, intrusion prevention (IPS), sandboxing, and file analysis as well as application control.
In general, do not apply 'Allow All' or 'None' when selecting a protection policy. These should only be used in special circumstances or for troubleshooting, never as an active protection policy.
Recommended protection best practices
TLS Inspection
Most internet traffic is encrypted with SSL/TLS making it impossible to secure without proper inspection.
XG Firewall v18 introduced the new Xstream TLS Inspection feature that provides high-performance inspection of encrypted traffic, enabling you to properly protect your network. Ensure you have one or more TLS inspection rules applied to your internet traffic, otherwise a lot of the protection discussed below will be ineffective. (Instructions: ‘SSL/TLS inspection rules' / Video: ‘Xstream SSL inspection in XG Firewall v18′).
You will need to deploy the XG Firewall SSL certificate on your client machines, which is accomplished easiest on Windows using the wizard in Microsoft's Group Policy Manager.
After deployment, monitor TLS inspection via the Control Center and add important problematic sites to the exception list with the convenient tools available from the widget.
Web policy and protection
This determines which websites are allowed or blocked and how to protect web traffic. Any firewalls governing internet traffic should have a web filtering policy in place.
There are several built-in policies for schools, workplaces, and more that you can use out-of-the-box to make this easy. Simply choose one appropriate for your organization and customize it to suit your needs. (Instructions: ‘How to implement Web Protection' instructions / Video: ‘How To: Creating Web Protection rules').
Malware and content scanning
XG Firewall can scan all web traffic for malicious code and downloaded files.
We strongly recommend that you take advantage of SophosLabs Threat Intelligence and Sophos Sandstorm sandboxing to further analyze files.
To do so, simply check the option to 'Detect zero-day threats with Sandstorm' for all rules governing web traffic. (Instructions: ‘How to configure Sophos Sandstorm').
IPS
Intrusion Prevention looks for activity attempting to exploit vulnerabilities in networked devices. This is a common technique for hackers to get control of servers exposed to the internet and to move laterally within a network. IPS protection signatures are included for all platforms: Windows, Macs, Unix, and more.
Make sure you are applying IPS protection policies that align with the network platforms in your environment – use either one of the built-in policies or create your own. Also, ensure you not only apply IPS protection to internet traffic rules but also rules between different segments of your internal network (e.g. LAN and DMZ) to help catch active threats trying to spread on your network. (Instructions: ‘IPS policies' / Video: ‘How To: Setting Up And Configuring IPS').
ATP
Advanced Threat Protection is another essential aid in identifying an active threat on your network. It examines outbound traffic for any attempts to contact known hacker command and control servers.
If an ATP is detected, it indicates you have a bot or threat on your network. ATP setup is super easy. (Instructions: ‘How to configure Advanced Threat Protection (ATP)').
Firewall best practices for blocking ransomware
Check out this white paper on additional best practices for blocking Ransomware attacks.
Sophos Xg 125 Firewall
VPN connectivity recommendations
With VPN connections being tremendously important these days, here are some additional resources on getting the most from your XG Firewall's VPN connectivity options.
Site-to-Site VPN: If you want the ultimate in VPN reliability and security between your central office and branch offices or remote locations, Sophos unique RED tunnels are ideal.
You can easily deploy an XG Firewall to a remote location without touching it and set up a RED tunnel in no time. (Instructions: ‘Substituting XG for RED devices via Light-Touch deployment from Sophos Central').
Remote user VPN: If you have users working remotely, XG Firewall offers a couple of options for secure remote access.
Our previous article outlined the various access options and their pros/cons. We recommend using Sophos Connect Client for the ultimate in ease-of-use. (Instructions: ‘Sophos Connect Client' / Video: ‘Sophos Connect VPN Client').
Sophos Xg 125 Specs
Helpful resources
Customer Resource Center (how-to videos, documentation, and more)
Sophos Xg 125 Review
How-To Video Library (dozens of video tutorials to get you started)
Sophos Xg 125 Dual Wan
XG Community (tap into the vast knowledge and expertise of the XG Firewall community)
