PeerGuardian 2 beta released
p2pnet.net News:- PeerGuardian 2 beta is now available for general download.
We’ve been using the private beta since February 17 and we’re here to tell you, as they say, that it works as advertised in all respects.
And forget visits to the control panel. This new PG beta, the last before the final Version 2, is fully automatic, meaning you don’t need to install a driver. And the new startup wizard makes things easier than ever.
Detailed settings can be configured from the interface, including logging and the ability to prevent websites from being blocked. A single IP address can be allowed for a period of time, or permanently, solving the problem of bad IP addresses.
And the new Methlabs reporting and database management systems mean you can play an active roll in preventing friendly IPs from being added.
You’ll find PeerGuardian 2 beta here, and PeerGuardian Lite here.
If you have any download problems, we have the files here as well.
PeerGuardian 2
- pg2-9x.exe PeerGuardian 2 for Windows 98/ME 585KiB
- pg2-nt.exe PeerGuardian 2 for Windows 2000/XP/2003 630KiB
- pg2-src.zip PeerGuardian 2 source 435KiB
PeerGuardian Lite
- pglite-bin.zip PeerGuardian Lite binaries 74KiB
- pglite-src.zip PeerGuardian Lite source 59KiB
PeerGuardian for Linux and Apple OSX are on the way, promises Methlabs.
PeerGuardian 2 blocks IP addresses at far higher speeds than previously, and it hasn’t driven above 1% CPU on most test systems, as we can confirm.
On Windows 2000 and greater, PeerGuardian 2 blocks at a kernel level, acting against every protocol used within the windows system, but for technical reasons, it blocks only TCP on Windows 98 or Me. However, it retains the same high performance as the Windows 2000 version.
Coming up?
The plugin system isn’t complete, and some improvements to the GUI are yet to come, says the developers. Otherwise, the PG2 beta fully functional.
Blocklist.org databases
The current p2p format database has been in existence since the original PeerGuardian was devised, and is now somewhat dated.
“Some changes and additions made to the database have made things worse, not better, and we’ve decided something needs to be done,” say Joseph Farthing and Cory Nelson.
“A new binary format database has been developed, which massively reduces the length of time it takes to download the database. Our new IPDB (IP Database) pages are also open at http://blocklist.org, allowing the user to submit ranges for inclusion in the database, and for ranges to be voted good or bad, and marked as incorrect.
“We hope that via community effort we can turn the sometimes inaccurate database into a much more accurate tool.”
Last,, and equaly important,.”PeerGuardian 2 is Open Source, meaning the program code is available online for anyone who wants it,” they add.
“Not only does this allow you to make modifications or even branch off into your own project, but it encourages peer review of the code making sure any bugs are eliminated swiftly. Because PeerGuardian 2 is Open Source, you can rest assured there are no back-doors or spy-ware included.”
Head over to IRC server irc.unitedp2p.net, channel #methlabs with questions or comments.
Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet..net
February 24th, 2005 at 11:18 pm
No granted packets logged?
So how to find out what was hitting you when one gets busted ?
So everyone needs a professional firewall to keep track?
great help to find the bad guys…. (not)
I was hoping someone making an ip-blocker would at least think of that…
I’ll stick with PW and the bluetack guys, they seem so much more on top of it all…
February 25th, 2005 at 1:34 am
NOTE! you still have to manually put guardingp2p in list! or at least i did. tryed connecting to mp** and ouch it did .i exported blocklist managers list into Peerguardian-2’s “list”folder >i had placed gardingp2p there and overwrote it. everything working great! 0-2 % CPU usage. and no bandwidth loss as with other programs [not naming] don’t want to open up a can of worms here.
February 25th, 2005 at 7:59 am
everyone needs a professional firewall – full stop
this is a BETA release of software that is still not quite complete
dont forget its OPEN SOURCE so you can always code it in yourself (it should be easy) or wait until we do
the key of this software is a far more efficiant back end than other software, much faster and more efficiant etc
try it, but if you dont have a firewall then an IP blocker is not going to help you!
February 25th, 2005 at 9:30 am
Which is a bit of a pain to install
but works great
February 25th, 2005 at 9:42 am
more or less the same features, same blocking capability, although it doesn’t keep a log of all connections
however your firewall should do this anyway
you should be no less safe with this than with protowall, but its a bit easier to manage and use. in addition it is open source so you can be sure that its not doing something secret that you dont want it to do
still server problems at methlabs though…!
February 25th, 2005 at 12:46 pm
thanks for the reply I will check out
since I started out using the “old” peer guardian and switched to protowall due to the fact that the old pg was a resource hog and pw seemed to filter more types of protocols.
I like the fact that its open source, should speed up development
now it would be great if there could be something like this for osx
my Mac buddies are always bitching they have no such software =))
ok either than “little snitch”
February 25th, 2005 at 3:43 pm
we’re working on it!
mac/linux version is coming
February 26th, 2005 at 8:03 am
Since you seem so “on top” of things, then you should already know that PeerGuardian and Protowall both make obvious claims that they are NOT firewalls, and should not be used in place of a firewall.
February 26th, 2005 at 8:04 am
Server problems have been fixed, and Beta2 has been released
February 27th, 2005 at 4:31 pm
If you put protowall and PG2 on the same system, protowall blocks packets before pg2 does.
The fact that you state you should have a firewall to log connections kind of makes me think methlabs folks couldn’t get PG2 to log granted and still keep the cpu/memory usage low. Protowall logs ALL traffic and cpu usage is almost always 0 on my system.
Is it being suggested that protowall is doing something in secret simply because its not open source? Open sourcing is only going to great headaches for methlabs as people will just repackage pg2 with spyware and trojans and stuff. In fact they’ve already experienced this already.
Bottom line, don’t give the advice to use a firewall if you want granted packets to be logged. Get in there and code the ability to log granted packets just as protowall logs granted packets.
April 20th, 2005 at 10:50 pm
PG2 logs accepted packets too and a lot more stuff besides (at least in the latest versions) – maybe this was posted about one of the early betas??
and the previous poster seemed to be a little paranoid that posters are suggesting Protowall does something malicious. I don’t think anyone was implying that. (I guess the previous poster was someone involved in Protowall and was offended by a suggestion that wasn’t actually made???)
Well… either way… both are great applications.
But with the latest changes, PG2 definetely seems to be stepping ahead, personally I can’t comment on Protowall from personal use as I couldn’t get it working on XP without connectivity problems. (probably my fault though)